


Countdown

by dem_bones



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Adora (She-Ra) Needs a Hug, Angst, Attempt at Humor, Best Friend Squad (She-Ra), Canon Compliant, Drama, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Oblivious Adora (She-Ra), POV Adora (She-Ra), POV Catra (She-Ra), POV Glimmer (She-Ra), Whump, bicons in space, i think im funny ok, im a sucker for drama ok, lesbeans in space, the whump comes later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:34:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 39,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26262742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dem_bones/pseuds/dem_bones
Summary: “How long have you been planning this?”There are several answers to this question. How long had Adora been planning on spending the rest of her life with Catra? Since she was a child. How long had she planned on actually marrying her? Four years. How long had she been actively thinking about what to give her and asking?“Last week.”ORMy take on a post S5 She-Ra movie that is part space drama and part roundabout proposal story. Because what's a proposal without a little mortal peril getting in the way?
Relationships: Adora & Catra (She-Ra), Adora/Catra (She-Ra), Bow & Glimmer (She-Ra), Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra)
Comments: 141
Kudos: 174





	1. I Can't Believe I'm Losing To A Bug

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first fic I have posted in many years, and of course it's She-Ra because I binged it in like 4 days and saw people going on about a movie so I was like "challenge accepted". 
> 
> This should stay T rated, no smut here. Basically, it's She-Ra but PG-13. Yes that means there will be one (1) f-bomb if I don't forget and add more. 
> 
> The chapter titles will be a mix of dumb and poignant which pretty much sums up my life. Also, I'll be posting some songs for later chapters, or may make a playlist of the "soundtrack". I've already got about a dozen songs lmao. I write all the fucking time but never publish a goddamn thing so this is my attempt to break that nasty habit.

The party is just starting to get rolling. It’s no princess prom but the atmosphere is playful and the music lively. The guests all dance, talk, eat, and most importantly...drink.

One in particular is taking advantage of the ample supply of alcohol and free tables. Adora fidgets with her hands, glancing over her shoulder often enough that she's developing a neck cramp. She takes another fervent sip of punch, wishing it were stronger, but she’s not bold enough to leave her table.

Why does this make her so nervous?

She pauses a moment, cracking open the palm sized wooden box for the hundredth time that evening. 

“Adora! There you are!”

Adora jumps, fumbling with the box in a desperate attempt to hide it. Glimmer sits down across from her right as she’s stuffing it away and looks up at her friend. She is the epitome of elegance, her new undercut suits her, and her shimmering pale purple gown is certainly easy on the eyes. All of this runs through Adora’s mind in rapid succession before she realizes she probably ought to say something. 

“Hi, I’m not doing anything, how are you?” She replies, cheeks burning scarlet. 

As Glimmer stares her down, the sheer force of her gaze reminds Adora of Angella; it is both heartwarming and terrifying. In a vain attempt at selling her doomed ruse, she offers up a shit-eating grin. Glimmer’s eyes turn to slivers of purple.

“What’s wrong Adora?”

“Wha…? Nothing, no - nothing's wrong.”

“Sure. Whatcha hiding?”

“Uh….”

Adora feigns polite confusion. It’s painful to look at, made evident by Glimmer’s face, and Adora’s facade falls away. She sighs, and with one last furtive glance around the room, retrieves the box from her pocket and scoots it across the table to her friend.

“Just don’t tell Catra.”

Glimmer stares at it with wide eyes. Adora can see she knows exactly what’s inside and her heart races even more. A gasp escapes the Queen of Brightmoon, and in the blink of an eye she is on the other side of the table kissing Adora’s face. 

_“Ack!”_

“Why didn’t you tell me!?”

This statement is followed by a swift and powerful smack to the shoulder. Adora rounds on her, defensive. 

“Hey! What was that for!?”

“‘Don’t tell Catra!?’ Why on Etheria would I tell her? Or what, are you asking somebody else?”

_“NO!”_

Adora gets a few looks at her exclamation - had she really been that loud? - but the music is enough to carry away the awkwardness. That doesn’t stop her already flushed face from deepening its color. She continues, lowering her voice to a level just shy of a whisper.

“Of course it’s Catra! I don’t know, I’m just…” She swallows, looking somewhat ill, and Glimmer’s irritated expression softens. “I’m so nervous.”

“Of course you are!”

“Nervous about what?”

Adora’s heart leaps into her throat again, but she relaxes when it’s Bow who pulls up a chair next to Glimmer, wearing a suit that nicely complements her dress while still maintaining the required window of exposed abs. Glimmer turns her beaming expression on him and holds the box up. For a moment, he stares at it, his expression slack. Hoping that he might decide it isn’t worth his time and leave, Adora looks away. 

She does not get her wish. 

Bow gasps.

“Oh... _oh!_ Wow Adora, I had no idea!” He claps his hands together, practically vibrating with excitement. A moment later, he too has rushed to her side of the table and given her a hug that rivals one of Scorpia’s. 

“Thanks Bow.” Adora wheezes.

He lets her go, and then his face shifts from elation to perplexed.

“Why didn’t you say anything? I could have given you some pointers...like maybe...not at an anniversary party?”

Glimmer smacks him on the arm. “Bow! Come on, this isn’t just any anniversary party! This is Spinerella and Netossa! The only downside of Adora proposing here would be Netossa bragging about planning the party where She-Ra got engaged for the next three years! Though he has a point I’d like to revisit...Adora, why didn’t you say anything? We’re kind of your best friends.”

Staring off into space, Adora gulps, and glances around again. Still no sign of Catra. Glimmer’s question jolts her back to reality and she stares down at her lap for a moment. She’s not sure she has an answer.

“I don’t know. I guess...it hadn’t really hit me yet? Until uh...yesterday.”

“How long have you been planning this?”

There are several answers to this question. How long had Adora been planning on spending the rest of her life with Catra? Since she was a child. How long had she planned on actually marrying her? Four years. How long had she been actively thinking about what to give her and asking? 

“Last week.”

“Are you serious?”

“It happened so quickly...and then whenever I tried to tell you...”

Glimmer returns the box, and squeezes her hand. Bow had asked her the month before on a trip to Mystacore. He’d told both her and Catra of his intentions beforehand, and despite being anxious he seemed to have done quite well. 

Unfortunately, Adora hadn’t asked for details. Because she’s an idiot. Had he gotten flowers? Should she have flowers? Is she doing this all wrong? Somehow, it’s a topic of discussion that rarely came up.

The only occasion where Catra had asked about it was at Spinerella and Netossa's anniversary party the previous year. Catra had squeezed the basics on marriage out of Adora, and then had the audacity to say nothing more on the subject than a brief "Oh, cool." Not that it was a bad response at the time, but the memory does little to boost Adora's confidence now. What if Catra isn’t ready? What if she doesn’t want it for herself? And why had Adora suddenly forgotten all about Bow and Glimmer’s engagement story? There’s so much spiraling in her head. She has so many questions; there's so much she’s done wrong, but instead of taking Bow up on his offer, words fall unprompted from her lips.

“I don’t feel well.”

“Adora, you are over thinking this! You’ll be fine.” Glimmer puts a hand on her shoulder. Is it her imagination or is there a hint of laughter in her eyes?

“Yeah, but-”

The floor beneath them shudders, and Adora has a sudden image of the hexagons disappearing from beneath their feet like they used to in the Horde. She jumps to her feet, adrenaline pumping. The shudder is followed by a distant explosion, and the music falters along with the guests, who cast anxious glances around the room. The lights flicker, threatening darkness, but stay lit and everything is quiet once more. All seems well, except a faint burning smell that reaches Adora’s nose.

“Adora…” Glimmer’s tone is suspicious. “Where _is_ your girlfriend anyway?”

_Uh oh._

**~~~~**

“See? I told you.”

“You are absolutely right. The auxiliary tank was way cooler.”

Frosta and Catra are standing on an old Fright Zone platform, staring at the charred remains of an auxiliary air tank, several floors below the dance floor. Frosta’s face looks like she took a dive in a chimney. Catra on the other hand, appears untouched, her mismatched eyes sparkling with joy at their success.

“Primary tanks are always filtered, and the airflow prevents any kind of mineral build up. But the auxiliary tanks are usually only refreshed once a year to keep them up to code. And that was years ago.” 

The primary tanks are also currently being used to filter the air upstairs. Despite Etheria's restorative magic, the Fright Zone still needs a little bit of filtration. 

“But why does that make them explode?”

“I tend not to question pyrotechnic perfection.”

“I want to blow something else up. How do you know what things blow up and what things don’t?”

Catra grins, turning to face the younger princess, her eyes alight with a childlike glow of excitement. She points to a yellow triangle on the side of the tank, adorned with three vertical facing red squiggles. It's roughly the size of her hand.

“That right there is the oldest, and most universal symbol. It means the contents are flammable.”

Frosta’s expression is priceless, and Catra wonders why the two of them weren’t doing this sooner. Then she remembers the Princess Prom she ruined a few years back. And the war. And the road trip. Well, perhaps this can make up for it...or begin to. 

There’s a clatter from above. Reacting on instinct, Catra jumps off the platform, leaving Frosta alone amid their destruction. By the time she realizes she has been abandoned, footsteps round the corner and she’s faced with the party planner and her wife, both with concerned expressions that turn suspicious as soon as they lay eyes on her. 

“Frosta!” Netossa hisses. “What on Etheria…?”

“Catra!” Frosta squawks. “It was her idea!”

“Uh huh.”

“Seriously!”

Watching the exchange from the safety of her hiding place, Catra almost feels sorry for Frosta. However, even with Frosta’s willing participation in mischief, Catra knows she will shoulder most of the blame. That was how it had been most of her life. The difference now is that she'll happily endure the punishment: being banished to her room for a few days, a room she shares with her girlfriend. The horror. Besides, if it means another person will follow in her chaotic footsteps, she'll take it. 

She also can’t help but be impressed by the way Frosta shifts the blame to Catra immediately, without hesitation. It makes her want to shed a tear of pride.

“Right,” Netossa sighs and shakes her head. “You shook the whole building! This place is under construction, you should be more careful.”

Netossa takes Frosta by the shoulder, steering her from the room and back to the party. Spinerella pauses before following them out, and surveys the room, eyes narrowed. 

“Catra?” She calls. Needless to say, there’s no response. With a soft huff of irritation, she also leaves. 

When the coast is clear, Catra climbs back on the platform and inspects the area around the demolished tank. There are a few pieces of shrapnel scattered at the base and one buried in a wall but there’s no sign of structural impact. They were four floors below the party….it shouldn’t have caused a disruption beyond the sound. Perhaps Netossa was being dramatic.

**~~~~**

“Do it again, Scorpia!”

“I’m not sure…”

“Oh come on, she doesn’t mind!”

“Does...does she mind?”

“I do not mind!”

“Okay, well, since she doesn’t mind!”

Scorpia sets down her sixth drink of the evening, reaches for Perfuma, and lifts her over her head. Even with pincers for hands, she somehow achieves this with the caution and precision of a dancer. Perfuma strikes a pose, her cheeks aflame - though Adora’s pretty convinced it’s not with alcohol - and laughing. This is met with cheers from the crowd, which includes an ecstatic Seahawk and a red faced Mermista. Adora can’t help but wonder what Catra would do if she did that to her...and a snort escapes her at the thought. She makes a mental note to try it some time.

“Perfuma, everyone!” Scorpia calls. “My BEAUTIFUL girlfriend! My best friend! My rock! Or uh, I guess...my flower? But a really tough flower, beautiful and tough, did I mention my girlfriend!?”

Adora chortles along with everyone else; if it were anyone else, she might blame the drink, but she knows better. Perfuma continues to blush and plants a flower crown on Scorpia’s head. There’s a few more cheers, and then Scorpia lowers her to the ground, giving her a peck on the lips, and once it’s evident the show is over the crowd disperses, resuming its amiable chatter.

After failing to locate Catra for interrogation purposes, and with Bow and Glimmer disappearing to the dance floor, Adora has indulged in a couple drinks. The punch hadn’t done it for her so she’d found something a little bit stronger at a different table. Having only nibbled on a few appetizers, it goes right to her head. She doesn’t drink very often, a fact Catra and Glimmer are not shy about pointing out whenever they take her to a party. She-Ra - as she’d discovered on a very friendly planet during their final road trip - can drink half a battalion under the table without getting dizzy. Adora unfortunately, is not so hardy. 

Usually it makes her giddy, but tonight it just heightens the sense of uncertainty. She had yet to see Catra since they’d arrived...has she been avoiding her? Had she found the box? Does she know Adora's plan? Is trying to evade it? Adora stifles a snort; of course, a plan had to exist in order for Catra to discover it. Her hand drops absentmindedly to her pocket again and finds the box still there.

“Wow, it would be impressive if Perfuma weren’t, you know...tiny.”

Whipping around, she finds herself face to face with Catra, and blinks. She’s sharp as always, the black suit neat and tidy save the undone bow tie, her hair down and tamer than usual, and that knowing smile plastered on her face. Adora’s mouth goes dry, her mind awash in static, but she shakes it off, the uncertainty fading away with it. Her eyes then settle on the undone bow tie, and she frowns.

“Why don’t you ever do these things right?” She grumbles, reaching out and fussing with it. Catra raises an eyebrow, her gaze trained on the tie, and says nothing. At least, not right away. Adora steps closer, her tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth.

“Adora.”

“Shhh...almost done.”

“That’s not how that goes.”

“Oh, well if you know then why can’t you do it? Hm?”

“Adora.”

“Shhh! I’m concentrating!”

This is followed by an impatient huff, and with one final flourish Adora finishes her task and looks back up at Catra with a big, self-satisfied grin. Her girlfriend meanwhile, is staring down at the ground, ears back, grimacing. Adora follows her gaze down to see that she’s standing on her foot. 

“Oh, sorry.” She giggles, stepping away. “You know if you wore shoes it wouldn’t be such a problem.”

“What? Pff. Nah. They make your feet sweaty and gross.”

“I had a dream about you wearing shoes once. Or a vision, or possibly even a premonition.”

“Yes, I know, you’ve told me many times.”

“It’s not that I don’t like seeing your feet. They’re perfect. You have beautiful toes.”

“I…Adora…”

“Perfect feet. You hear?!” Adora raises her voice. “Catra has _perfect_ feet!”

There’s a smattering of laughter and Catra’s cheeks darken, eyes narrowed as she shoots her a glare. Adora grins; she isn’t that drunk but if it means she can embarrass Catra she doesn’t mind playing it up a bit.

“If my feet are so perfect, then why do you have a thing about me wearing shoes?”

“I can count on one hand the number of days it's been since I pulled glass out of your feet.”

“Ha, ha. Liar.”

“You’re right, I’m sorry. Three days ago it was a shard of wood.”

Catra shrugs. “No big deal.”

“It was an inch long.”

“Details.”

“You scratched me.”

“I could have sorted it out myself. How much have you had to drink anyways?”

“Mmm…” Adora leans up against Catra’s shoulder, wrapping her arms around her slim form. She lets out a contented sigh, forgetting all about the box and her plans for a moment. “Enough. You smell like charcoal. It’s nice.”

She also smells like other things, things that are inexplicably Catra.

“I didn’t know charcoal smelled good.”

“It’s like a warm fireplace…” Adora mumbles. “At least, when you wear it. Is that why you wear black? It’s sexy.”

“I knew there was a reason I loved you.” Catra chortles, resting her chin on top of Adora’s head.

“Because I like the smell of charcoal?”

“Yep. No other reason.”

“Uh huh…”

“Idiot.”

Unable to resist, Adora pulls away from her shoulder and straightens up to kiss her. Catra returns it lazily, her hands sliding around Adora's waist who, lost in the moment, forgets that her pockets are also at her waist. At least, until she feels the corner of the box digging into her hips a little more than it should. She’s about to panic when somebody interrupts them.

“Come on, get a room!”

Catra breaks away first, her eyes curious, but she’s drawn in quickly by the naysayer, who turns out to be Netossa. She’s smirking at them, and perhaps once Adora might have been embarrassed, but she can’t be bothered anymore. 

“Oh I’m sorry, were we making you uncomfortable?” Catra snaps. 

“Nah, just can’t stand you two anymore.”

“Excuse me, who saved the universe? Oh that’s right, us!” Catra grins. “Uh huh. Deal with it!”

Netossa snorts, shaking her head at the both of them and turning away. However, before she gets far there’s a shout that stops everyone within a twenty foot radius in their tracks.

_“HEY!”_ They turn to see Seahawk staring at them with wide eyes. “Scorpia! You’re next opponent!”

Mermista and Scorpia both whip around, and Mermista has a gleam in her eyes usually reserved for arson and Mer-Mystery novels. It’s unsettling.

“Yes!”

“She-Ra! She-Ra verses Scorpia!” Somebody calls from the crowd.

Seahawk then takes it upon himself to lead the three of them in a very simple, very drunk, and very loud chant.

_“SHE-RA! SHE-RA! SHE-RA! SHE-RA!”_

“Uhhh…” Adora stares. “What?”

“Seems pretty obvious to me. They want She-Ra.” Catra mutters. 

“For what?!”

“SHE-RA!” Scorpia bellows. “I challenge you to an arm-wrestling contest!” This is met with a smattering of responses that merges slowly with Seahawk and Mermista's chant until it reaches a volume that is almost painful.

“Come on!” Seahawk wails over the noise. “We haven’t laid eyes on Etheria’s fair defender in years! And being the only heroic figure in the room is terribly tiresome. Surely she will rise to this challenge?!”

Adora blinks. It hasn’t actually been that long, has it? She’s pretty sure it’s been less than a year. Her gaze drifts to Scorpia, who stares at her with big begging eyes, pincers clasped together, lip stuck out so far it looks painful. Really? An arm-wrestling match? Isn't She-Ra meant for more important things? It feels wrong to bring She-Ra out for something so...frivolous.

“What’s the matter Princess, scared you might lose? I have to say, I’ve got my money on Scorpia.”

Snapping out of her stupor, Adora whips around to face Catra, who smirks. A surge of irritation swells in her chest; she knows exactly what Catra is doing. They both know Adora isn't about to back down either, so she might as well play it up. She mirrors Catra’s smirk, and polishes off the last of her drink.

“If I win you have to wear shoes.”

“Deal.”

“I get to pick them out.”

“Fine by me. If Scorpia wins you stop bugging me about it.”

“Then get ready for a new pair of gold laced knee highs!” She yells. “For the Honor of Grayskull!”

There’s a wild cheer as She-Ra emerges. Seahawk dances to the nearest table, wrenching the tablecloth, cutlery, and three plates of food to the floor in one fell swoop before bowing away, his eyes sparkling with anticipation. 

Even though the transformation burns off the effects of the alcohol in seconds, the fire of competition has replaced intoxication and there’s no going back. Adora and Scorpia sit down across from each other, locking hand with pincer, poised for battle. Seahawk crouches down so that only his head hovers above the table, holding up his fingers for the countdown.

“Three...two…one…!”

Immediately both women keep relaxed expressions, staring at each other, daring the other to show any sign of weakness. However, as the battle rages, it dawns on them both how well matched they are. Scorpia’s face gets redder, clashing with her exoskeleton, while She-Ra has to concentrate on not using any powers. After all...that would be cheating, and Adora honestly hadn’t expected it to be this much of a challenge in the first place. Then she remembers Scorpia threw a tank at her once, so maybe she should have seen this coming. 

“Come on Adora!” Glimmer’s voice breaks through the crowd; evidently the impromptu competition has stopped even the dance floor. 

“Crush her!” Frosta screams from somewhere, but nobody has any idea who she’s rooting for.

“Come on Scorpia, you can do this!” Scorpia mutters.

Adora says nothing, fighting down her powers and focusing on the simple, brute strength of She-Ra instead. 

“She-Ra! She-Ra!”

“Come on, Scorpia!”

_BOOM._

The floor shudders, but it’s nothing like before. It’s a surge, moving through the floor panels like liquid as it buckles and warps in a wavelike pattern. The walls crack, the lights flicker and go out plunging the room into darkness save the emergency lights on the walls. Both Adora and Scorpia leap back from each other as though they’ve received a shock.

Heart pounding, Adora scans the crowd, seeking her friends but even as She-Ra, her eyes haven’t adjusted yet. The shaking stops abruptly, and for a moment, not a single person moves, or makes a sound.

“What the hell was that?”

After a few seconds, the lights turn back on. Adora might have laughed at Catra being the one to break the silence if the whole ordeal hadn’t unsettled her so much. She’s about to call Catra out for her earlier pyrotechnics breaking something when her thoughts are interrupted by a searing pain across her temple. It’s powerful enough to take away any cry or scream she might have uttered, reducing her voice to a shuddering gasp as her hand flies to her head. She squeezes her eyes shut, which turns out to be a mistake; instead of darkness, she sees a blinding light behind her eyelids. Adora clutches her head and sinks to her knees. The light shifts to something else, but she’s in so much pain that the images flashing across her vision are impossible to make sense of.

“Stop!” She gasps.

She-Ra’s form flickers, and then shrinks and she’s Adora again, sitting on the floor, trembling. The brightness fades, and after a few moments, the pain follows. Yet in its wake it leaves a vacuum, like her skull is caving in on all sides. She opens her eyes and tries to blink it away, but the world is spinning like water down a drain. Is that a face hovering in front of her? Is somebody calling her name? She blinks slowly in a last ditch attempt to clear her vision, only to find herself totally blind. Her eyes roll back into her head, and she knows no more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're off! Kudos and comments welcome, let me know if you like a thing, or if you don't like a thing let me know as well so I can cry about it later! 
> 
> Also hit me up on tumblr: [library-of-crazy-221b](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/) (ive had the same url and skin for 10 years, i forgot how to change the skin and can't be bothered to change the url. it's where im at)


	2. Old Habits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo! We're back. A little angst for you. Thanks to [Too_fucking_salty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Too_fucking_salty/pseuds/Too_fucking_salty) for giving this a once over :D. Go check out their ridiculous and delightful AU which includes catradora as small, slightly evil, and very adorable children. Thanks to my other editor as well who does not have an account here but shout out to my fabulous lady anyways!!! Thanks to you both for making this heap of a story better.
> 
> Also made a few light edits to the first chapter, nothing that requires a reread though (unless you're into that kind of thing). 
> 
> Enjoy!

The quiet of the infirmary is oppressive; once there would have been the drone of activity from the Fright Zone; now in peacetime it’s almost silent, save the sound of Adora’s gentle snoring and the thudding of her own heartbeat. It’s maddening. 

Catra shifts, hands tightening around her knees, tail curling around her feet as she watches Adora from a few feet away. She looks peaceful, which is more than could have been said a couple hours ago. The image of her laying there, eyes slits of white, each breath rapid and shallow, is still seared in the forefront of her mind. 

She thinks back to the last time she’d felt this frustrated and fearful. It was during their road trip on a planet whose name she can’t remember, and Adora had been poisoned by a handful of angry residents. It had struck her with the same, sudden violence as today, and while admittedly, her life had been in greater danger then, the feeling it evoked for Catra is still quite similar. If She-Ra hadn’t taken over after Adora had fallen unconscious, it definitely would have killed her. 

Her worried mind wanders to their road trip to the stars; it hadn’t all been terrifying. Some of it had been entertaining, like when they landed on the Star Siblings’ new planet, and she’d had the joy of seeing Adora drunk silly on a few glasses of whatever mystery alcohol they had. No, the first year or so of their travels had been mostly good. It wasn’t until they’d gotten to the outer systems that things got dicey, and after Adora was poisoned it lost all of its fun; the remaining months had been a chore to get through.

She is pulled back to the present by the creak of bedsprings. Adora rolls over to face her and sighs, brow creasing and a small frown on her lips. Unfolding her tingling legs, Catra hops off her chair and sits carefully on the edge of the bed. Is she starting to rouse? Her snoring has stopped, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. She’s about to call one of the medics when Adora stirs again. 

“Is it over?”

Catra blinks. Well, there’s her answer.

“The party? Yeah, it’s over.” 

Adora groans. 

“Damn,” She mutters. “Did I win?”

Catra cocks an eyebrow, but before she can answer Adora grimaces, rubbing her temple and a low moan escapes her.

“Adora?” Catra says in little more than a whisper, like she’s afraid she’ll hurt her if she speaks too loud. She reaches out and takes her hand. “Oh no, Adora, tell me you aren’t brain damaged…”

The words slip out before she can stop herself. It’s a stupid question, but evidently the right one because Adora chuckles. 

“It’s just a headache,” She says. “What is it with you and brain damage?”

“A headache can be a sign of brain damage, idiot! And you weren’t wearing your hair poof, so it’s not like it could protect you. I have every right to be concerned.”

“Pfft…”

Adora opens her eyes, blinking away the sleep. It’s a relief to see she looks no worse for wear than if she was merely recovering from a rowdy night. Catra smiles.

“Hey, Adora.” She says softly. 

“Hey.”

Adora watches her placidly for a moment, and then her eyes drift away from her face, as though she’s studying her appearance. Her gaze lands on the tie, and she smirks.

“Nice bow tie.”

“Oh, I had some repair work to do after your hack job.” Catra replies without hesitation. 

“Uh huh. Sure.”

“I speak only the truth. Do you need anything? Water? Food?” Catra asks as she rolls her eyes. 

“Yes.”

“Yes to which?”

“I need something.”

“What?”

“You. I need you … to come over here so I can stare lovingly into your beautiful eyes.”

“I’m right in front of you, dork. Do you need anything else?” Catra is unable to stifle another heavy eye roll, for which she gets a snort of laughter.

“I suppose a glass of water would be good as well. But mostly I just want to look at you.”

“You’re totally brain damaged.” Catra says as she fills a glass and sits back down on the bed, handing it to her. 

Adora sits up carefully, taking a moment to steady herself before she takes it with a murmured thanks and downs it in about ten seconds. 

“Oh yeah...that’s the stuff.”

“Good. So, Adora, what hap-”

“Hit me with another one of those, will ya?”

Catra shakes her head; as much as she loves her, she’s also well aware of what Adora is trying to do, and it creates a slight tingle of frustration in her gut.

“Okay, but-”

“I’ll pay you with a kiss.”

Refilling the glass, Catra is tempted to take that offer, but she has more pressing questions that need answers. Frowning, she hands over the second glass and takes the opportunity to speak while Adora is drinking. 

“What happened?”

Adora hesitates, poised with the glass to her lips for a spell before lowering it slowly to her lap and staring down at her hands. The lighthearted humor melts away, and if Catra weren’t so determined to get Adora’s take on what happened, she would have felt guilty. 

“I don’t know. I was fine, and then I wasn’t.”

Catra stares. “Are you kidding me?”

Adora still isn’t looking at her, and it makes her blood boil with frustration and building anger. Has she forgotten that Catra can read her like a book? Is she that stupid? Maybe she really is brain damaged. 

“You really think -” She begins, a distinct hard edge to her voice.

They both jump; it’s a knock on the door, and Glimmer pokes her head in. Her worried expression softens upon seeing Adora sitting up, and she steps inside. 

“Adora.” Relief rolls off of her in waves as she hurries over. 

Catra gets to her feet in a quick, rigid motion to give Glimmer some space. A moment later, Bow follows and she has to fight the urge to run out of the room as he and Glimmer converge on the bed. 

“Adora, thank goodness,” Bow says. “How are you feeling?”

“Oh you know,” Adora says with halfhearted cheer. “Just peachy.”

“Do you remember what happened?”

“I…” She trails off, her eyes flicking towards Catra and then back to her lap again. 

Catra’s tail twitches. 

“No. I don’t. Not really.”

_Liar._

Adora is putting on a good show, especially given her track record as a piss poor actor. But Catra knows her, and she knows that there’s more she isn’t saying. It’s so obvious to her that it’s downright hurtful that Adora seems to think she’ll buy her _shoddy_ explanation. She’s desperate to call her out and make her talk, but she stops herself; Adora just woke up, she needs to give her a little time.

Glimmer and Bow don’t seem to get it, or they’re not as concerned about what Adora is hiding. Either way, they give no visible indication that they can see through her facade. Bow reaches out to take her hand, and smiles, face awash with sympathy.

“Well, we’ve been in Entrapta’s lab. We were trying to figure out if there was any unusual outside activity that corresponded with the earthquake and your uh...illness.”

“Oh,” Adora says, rubbing her arm. “What did you find?”

“Entrapta needs more data to be sure,” Glimmer says. “But she did see a big energy spike after you transformed.”

“Of course,” Bow adds. “She-Ra always does that. But this was...bigger.”

“What do you mean by that?” Adora says sharply. 

Bow shifts, looking uncomfortable. 

“She thinks it might have been unstable magic.”

“You mean...She-Ra is becoming unstable?” Adora’s voice is hollow, and it sends a shiver down Catra’s spine. 

“Not necessarily,” Bow says in a rush. “She-Ra could be reacting to something.”

“Like what?” Catra says. “An outside source?”

“There might be. We were looking into that right before we came to check on you.”

“Then why weren’t there any readings before?” Adora says. 

“I don’t know. Entrapta needs to keep looking to see if a similar waveform shows up again.”

A ringing silence follows this. Catra glances at each of her friends in turn and lingers on Adora again. She barely seems to notice Catra, lost in thought, her expression rigid. 

“Adora…” Glimmer begins, voice soft. Adora startles, and then swings her legs over the side of the bed without warning. 

She nearly hits Bow, who scrambles backwards. Glimmer jumps forward, putting a hand on her shoulder. 

“Whoa, Adora where do you think you’re going?” 

“I’m going to see Entrapta,” She replies with conviction. “I just want to see it for myself.”

It takes all of her self control for Catra not to bristle visibly. There’s the old Adora, always needing to fact check, always needing to do things herself. Why can’t she just trust her friends? After all the work they’ve put in, for her to suddenly throw it all away now is like a slap in the face. This is the sort of thing they had encountered in the months following Prime’s defeat, not now. It is infuriating as it is frightening, and before she can stop herself, words jump to her lips. 

“What, our word not good enough for you?” She says coldly. A long pause follows, and Catra flinches internally at the sound of her own voice.

“No,” Adora says. Her eyes widen. “I mean...yes...I…I just want to ask her some questions, okay?”

“Well, take it easy. We’ll go with you.” Bow says this evenly, though his jaw is lined with tension. 

Adora merely nods, glancing at Catra with a pained expression. Catra looks away, ears flattening and her tail lashes back and forth faster; cursed thing, always giving her away. At least Melog isn’t here to ruin her facade entirely, though maybe they would have forced a conversation. Maybe that would have been a good thing.

Thinking of Melog eases the anger, but she still doesn’t look at Adora as she passes her on the way to the door, with Glimmer at her arm. Melog had been a near constant companion for most of their road trip. A few months before their return, Melog had gotten a call from their home planet and gone back to seek out returning survivors, and restore the planet to its former magic. That had been almost two years ago now. 

“Adora, what’s wrong?”

Glimmer’s anxious voice cuts through Catra’s thoughts and she looks up, insides churning. Adora has stopped, rigid as a board. Her hand drifts towards her hip, glancing over the soft red fabric, and then she jerks it away like she’s been electrocuted. There’s a long pause, and then she actually shakes her head as though attempting to clear it.

“Sorry. Just…” She sighs. “Let’s go.”

_Another lie._

“Okay…” Glimmer says, eyes narrowed. 

She and Glimmer leave the room, and Bow is about to follow when he pauses and turns to Catra, brow knitted with concern. 

“Catra, are you coming?” 

“I’ll catch up in a minute.” She says with a grim smile. Bow nods, and exits, leaving the door open a crack. 

She’s not sure if she will.

~~~~

Adora is torn. She’s trying to focus on what Entrapta is saying, trying not to focus on her headache, and really trying not to think about where the hell the box went. She fails at all three tasks, and her hand drifts again to her now empty pocket as though this time it might be there. What had happened to it? Had somebody found it and taken it? There’s a laundry list of possibilities, none of which make her feel any better. Her only hope is that maybe Bow or Glimmer picked it up, and hadn’t said anything yet because they didn’t want Catra to get suspicious.

Catra. Her icy accusation still rings in Adora’s ears, painfully familiar. It makes her feel five years younger. But Catra doesn’t understand, none of them do. How can she explain something she doesn’t understand herself? She isn’t even convinced that what she saw and heard aren’t simply her imagination. Yet still, as she recalls the moment before she had transformed back into herself, she remembers a voice, and a planet, neither of which she recognizes. And now the memory of the incident is so hazy that she isn’t even sure she could describe it to them if she wanted to. There’s no good explanation except perhaps something she can glean from Entrapta.

“…There it is!”

Snapping back to the present, Adora lurches around to look at the screen Entrapta has turned to face them. She has to squint to keep the mass of lines and numbers from drifting out of focus, and it makes her head pound even harder. 

“Right there,” Entrapta gestures to a data point sitting far away from the rest. “This is the Fright Zone probe, I have a few dozen placed all over the planet taking readings! It takes one every five minutes, not enough to capture an entire event of course, I’ll have to dial up the frequency for that. But it’s definitely a big energy pulse! It’s about three times as powerful as She-Ra is normally, and you can see that it also corresponds to this point-” She races to a separate monitor. “- here! I picked this up on the Thaymore probe. It occurred approximately thirty-eight microseconds after the first one! Now, that propagation speed would imply an electromagnetic wave, but I don’t have enough resolution to confirm that it isn’t just a timing offset.”

“Electromagnetic? Like a signal?” Bow asks, frowning.

“Maybe!” Entrapa crows. “It’s more likely an offset though.”

“Like, the probes aren’t all synced?” Bow asks, and Adora is glad he’s on top of the questions now because her nerves are making coherent thought difficult. “How big of an offset do you think they could have?”

“Not sure! They are supposed to take measurements in unison, but some could drift over time. Etheria’s been quiet for the last few years, electromagnetically speaking. I haven’t had a need for precision measurements, I’ve been making progress elsewhere. Like this: Emily! Think fast!”

She seizes a piece of piping and throws it at the robot sitting next to her. The instant before it hits, the air shimmers pale blue and the pipe, rather than denting the metal shell, bounces off harmlessly.

“I found this new shield tech on Beast Island!” It’s taken me months to get rid of all the corrupted code but it's magnificent, and portable! I can’t wait to-”

“Entrapta, focus.” Glimmer says in a stern voice. 

“Right, sorry. Where was I? Oh yeah! The probes. They’re probably offset, I haven’t checked them for synchronization in a while. I’ll be making some adjustments, and I’m running all the probes at five-hundred millisecond intervals now so I can catch more if it happens again! Adora, do you think you can turn into She-Ra?”

“No!” Bow jumps in before Adora can say anything. “Not tonight. She needs rest.”

Adora huffs with irritation, but he’s right; her head is pounding so hard she’s surprised nobody else has commented on somebody beating a drum in the lab. Entrapta looks faintly disappointed, but she doesn’t argue. 

“Well, then that’s all I have for now.”

“You don’t have any other ideas why this could be happening?” Adora asks, acutely aware of the desperation in her voice.

“Nope! I won’t make premature theories, but on the off chance that She-Ra’s powers are unstable you should wait to transform until you’re in the lab, or at least somewhere we can better contain a blast!”

“A…a blast?”

Entrapta seems to realize - albeit belatedly - that her choice of words are a little bit wanting for tact.

“Uh, I mean…if something happens like today, we don’t want it to be somewhere that could cause damage. Or an explosion.”

 _Oh no, that’s much worse._ Adora can feel the color draining from her face.

“I doubt it will come to that,” Bow says, his voice rising in pitch. “Thank you for the information, Entrapta.”

“No problem!”

Adora forces a grim smile and nods her thanks to Entrapta. As she turns to leave, she sees Catra standing next to the doorway, her face impassive, arms folded. How long has she been there? Their eyes meet for a moment, and both of them look away at the same time. The knot of anxiety and guilt writhing in the pit of Adora’s stomach grows. All Adora has now is more questions, and what little evidence has been gathered points to an issue with _her_. Is she losing her mind? Is she losing She-Ra? 

She wants to explain herself, but her jaw is locked with tension, her throat stuck to itself. Bow puts a hand on her shoulder as they walk out. Catra watches them all, her expression still the same and then falls in step beside Glimmer. She doesn’t say anything, so Glimmer answers her unspoken question. 

“Nothing really new. There’s a chance that it could be a signal causing it.”

Catra raises her eyebrows, but says nothing and Adora looks away. Wordlessly, the four of them go to their adjacent rooms to begin packing for the return to Brightmoon. The original plan was to stay in the Fright Zone overnight, but now given the circumstances, all Adora wants is to go home. Go home, and then maybe she can clear her head, and get to the bottom of whatever the hell is wrong with her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And zee plot thickens!!
> 
> Let me know what you think! Comment, kudos, hit me up on tumblr at [library-of-crazy-221b](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/), whatever suits your fancy. I don't bite.


	3. Of Cake and Feelings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact, this chapter title was decided in a coin toss! Because why not? Thanks Too_fucking_salty for the suggestion, and as usual, for giving this monster chapter a once-over. And shout out to my other editor, Jess, who still doesn't have an account here but I'm working on it...she'll be converted soooon.
> 
> Here's 4.5k for you all, originally it was split into two chapters but they wanted to be together man, who am I to split them up? This will also be the last chapter before a short break while I get a few chapters ahead so I can get my thoughts organized and make sure all my conspiracies line up. Ya know, the usual stuff. Thank you all for reading, and enjoy!

The return to Brightmoon is far less entertaining than the journey to the Fright Zone had been. Bow attempts to break the silence with small talk several times, and is rewarded with single word responses from Adora and nothing from Catra. Glimmer tries to help him out, but each time the conversation dies. Needless to say, she teleports them back as soon as they’re in range.

Adora and Catra disappear almost immediately upon stepping through the main gates, leaving Bow and Glimmer alone for the time being. This is fine, as Glimmer needs to sort out some paperwork and prepare for the next day’s meetings. Bow accompanies her, assisting when he can, and idly strumming his lute when he can’t; it makes the tedious work rather pleasant. It is well into the night by the time she’s done, and they leave satisfied and in better spirits.

“Do you think they’re all right?” Bow asks with a frown as they make their way toward their room.

Glimmer doesn’t need him to clarify who he’s talking about, and shrugs. “No. But you know Adora and Catra. They need time to sort it out.”

“Yeah. This could be a big deal, I mean, if She-Ra is causing problems…”

“We don’t have all the answers yet, and they both know that.”

Bow frowns. “Adora has something more though -- something she’s not telling us.”

“Something big?” Glimmer doesn’t like the tone of his voice.

“Well…I think if it were _really_ bad she would have been better at hiding it.”

“You’re right. I hate that you’re right.”

“I hate it too. Hopefully she’ll tell us soon.”

“Or at least tell Catra before she goes crazy.”

“Mmm…” Bow trails off, lost in thought, and Glimmer frowns at him.

She’s worried about Adora, and worried about the implications of the potential causes of the incident. But a selfish side of her wants to enjoy the rare alone time with her fiancé. 

Even with the ever-expanding Brightmoon council, and her Dad’s (often overbearing) assistance, ruling a kingdom and being the member of the Princess Alliance is extremely demanding work. Four years of rebuilding has yielded excellent progress, but since Brightmoon sustained less damage than other regions, Glimmer is constantly helping to shift resources, clones, and other volunteers all over Etheria. Hordak and Whordak -- pronounced Wor-Dak, as the clone formerly known as “Wrong Hordak” had proclaimed (something Glimmer found too entertaining to fuss over) -- have been a big help in organizing clone efforts and clean up, and still manage to maintain an efficient and effective workforce all over Etheria to this day. 

Either way, she’s been far too busy to actually enjoy being engaged, and she wants some of that time back. She takes his arm.

“Bow.” She says urgently.

“Glimmer.” He matches her tone.

“It’s been a whole month since our engagement. I think we should celebrate while the night is still young.”

Bow’s eye’s light up, the worry melting off his face. “What did you have in mind?”

Glimmer grins suggestively, and despite the fact that they are engaged and entirely alone, Bow’s cheeks flush. She rolls her eyes and smiles, taking his hands and standing on tiptoes to kiss him. 

“I think the cake has been left undisturbed for far too long.” She breathes. 

“Glimmer…” Bow whispers, the sense of urgency in his tone so over the top she has to stifle a snort. “Are you sure it's safe? Your father might disagree.”

“Well it’s a damn good thing he’s not the Queen of Brightmoon, isn’t it?”

Glimmer teleports them to the kitchens, and they’re both laughing as they appear. Their bliss is ruined by something large lurking in her peripheral. Her heart leaps into her throat, and she whips around with a shout, hands glowing. Bow squeals, and as the lights come on, the object of their panic is revealed.

“Scorpia?” They say in unison. 

Scorpia freezes mid-bite. She has an entire tub of ice cream in the crook of her arm, and appears to have been scooping it directly with her pincers. She gulps down the bite she had been taking and Glimmer can see the regret as she shudders, and her eyes water. 

Bow is the first to recover. “Scorpia! Why are you here? What’s wrong?”

“Oh, ha, you know,” Scorpia scratches her head awkwardly, leaving a smear of ice cream in her hair. “Little late night snack.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be in the Fright Zone?” Bow asks.

“I was worried about Adora! I mean, Catra said she was fine, but then you all left, and I feel like...like I’m responsible for…”

As she trails off, Glimmer sighs, having to stifle a chuckle. “Oh Scorpia, don’t blame yourself. Something else happened to She-Ra, I promise you it wasn’t your fault.”

“Oh, wow, that’s a relief.” Scorpia lets out a nervous laugh, and takes another bite of ice cream. “I was really scared that I’d broken her somehow. Do you know what happened?”

Glimmer bites her lip so hard she wonders if it might start bleeding. She feels a little guilty; it’s clearly a serious situation, and Adora wouldn’t appreciate the information right now, but the fact that Scorpia thinks she broke She-Ra because of an arm wrestling match is the most hysterical thing she’s heard in weeks. She clears her throat, recovering her composure and gives Scorpia a warm smile.

“Nope,” She says confidently. “You didn’t break her. We’re not sure what happened yet, I think we’ll know more in the morning. Of course...you’re welcome to stay. And you’re welcome to have the ice cream too.”

Scorpia brightens. “Thanks Glimmer! Is it okay if I bring it back to mine and Perfuma’s room?”

“Perfuma is here too?”

“Well yeah, I told her why I was worried, and she thought I should come here and find you.”

“So you went to the kitchen and...ate ice cream?”

“Oh, well this wasn’t part of the plan. I was wandering the halls searching for you, and I bumped into Mermista. She told me about the ice cream.”

Glimmer stares at her; the last she heard was that only Entrapta would be visiting Brightmoon. However, it seems that the entire Princess Alliance all had the same idea. On the off chance that something more nefarious is going on it is nice to have them here, but it is still both amusing and alarming that they all managed to show up without her hearing about it.

“Okay. Do you know if Frosta is here too?”

“She might be, I don’t know for sure.”

Glimmer sighs heavily. “Right. We’ll meet in the morning, maybe Entrapta will have more information then. Go ahead and take that ice cream back to your room.”

“Okay, thanks again Glimmer!”

Scorpia makes a hasty exit, leaving the two of them alone. Glimmer looks up at Bow, who is still watching the door as though he’s suspicious Scorpia might come back. Glimmer puts a hand on his shoulder. He looks deep in thought.

“What are you thinking about?” She asks.

“It’s nice having everyone here,” he says after a moment. “ I’ve gotten so used to it just being the four of us. But having all the other Princesses around for something that isn’t, you know, a function...well...it’s nice. Kind of like old times, but with less...mortal peril.”

Glimmer chuckles. “Careful, don’t jinx it.” She pauses. “It is nice.” 

They stand in comfortable silence for a moment before Glimmer breaks it, her eyes alight with enthusiasm. “Okay. Let’s worry about tomorrow when it shows up. Now? Now, we eat cake.”

They’re quick to find and begin demolishing the kitchen’s surprisingly light cake supply. After a few minutes of mostly silent eating, Glimmer decides this is much too boring, so she grabs a fist full of frosting and slaps it on Bow’s cheek. 

“Hey!” He squawks.

“Aw, you look so handsome.”

A moment later Glimmer’s vision is obscured by pink, and she squeals in protest, dodging as Bow lunges for her. There’s a brief, fierce chase in which Glimmer is quick to wipe the frosting away from her eyes, and happily teleports around the kitchen to keep out of his grasp. 

“Glimmer, that’s cheating!” Bow whines. 

As an answer, she snags a towel from the kitchen sink and teleports right in front of him, hands on her hips. Then, she reaches up and wipes the frosting off his face, still giggling. He in turn does the same for her, but when he’s finished he merely tosses the towel aside and runs his fingers along her cheek. He sighs, content.

“Happy one month engagement,” he says, and Glimmer’s heart soars.

“I’m so glad you’re my fiancé.” She replies softly.

“Me too.”

He leans over and kisses her gently, and the world stops around them. For a moment, everything really is quite perfect. When they break apart, Glimmer slides her hand around the back of his neck and presses her forehead against his. She could stay like this forever.

However, the threat of early morning meetings on very little sleep is not to be ignored, so she opens her eyes and pulls back with a soft huff of irritation. Bow merely nods, smiling in understanding, putting his arm around her and glancing at the mess they made.

“Should we clean this up?”

“Oh...right.”

With a light flick of her wrist, Glimmer produces a purging spell, and all evidence of their cake-fueled entertainment is swept into the nearby trash bin, leaving the place spotless. Bow makes his own contribution by grabbing the hand towel and tossing it effortlessly across the kitchen into the small laundry bin kept for just such a purpose. Glimmer rolls her eyes.

“Show off.”

“Hey, not a rebellion fighter anymore...gotta use my skills for something.”

“Of course you do. Shall we? I feel like walking.”

“The longer we have, the better.”

They walk in silence through the halls until they reach Adora and Catra’s room. Glimmer pauses. Her brow furrows, and Bow follows her gaze.

“We should check on them.” He volunteers.

“Yeah...just quick…”

Glimmer taps gently on the door, but hears nothing inside. Hoping that this isn’t like the last time she’d flung open their closed-door without explicit permission, Glimmer squints and pushes the door open cautiously. There’s no response. She cracks an eye open, and peers through the narrow opening. The bed is empty, and while Glimmer isn’t surprised, she is a little concerned. Hopefully they are together wherever they are.

“Don’t you know it’s rude to snoop around people’s rooms?”

Bow squeals and Glimmer whips around, hand inadvertently clutching his arm, and is about to go on the defensive when she realizes it’s Catra. She’s watching them with crossed arms and the ghost of a grin, and snorts at their reaction. Glimmer shoots her a dirty look; every so often -- and especially when she startles her like this -- Glimmer still sees the Horde soldier they’d fought against. The fact that she’s grown her hair out again isn’t helpful, even though it’s much tamer than it used to be.

“Okay first of all we weren’t snooping; we weren’t even in the room. Second of all, why are you up?”

This earns her a raised eyebrow; even though Glimmer is aware it’s a stupid question, she wants to hear the answer. Catra’s tail twitches slightly but her expression doesn’t change. 

“The ice cream is gone.”

“That was Scorpia.”

“I know.”

“Wait,” Bow interjects. “How did you know she and Perfuma were here?”

“They showed up with the other princesses like two hours ago. What were you two doing?”

“Working,” Glimmer is unable to keep a lid on her frustration. “Not sure why nobody bothered to tell us.”

“They told me.”

“What were you, the Brightmoon Greeter?”

“Sure.”

Glimmer has a few more things to say about this, but decides given the circumstances that she isn’t going to lecture Catra about how being a member of the Brightmoon Council means telling the Queen about things, like the entire Princess Alliance showing up. She sighs, and decides to get to the point. 

“Where’s Adora? She should be sleeping.”

Catra frowns. “She’s not in the room?”

“No. We thought she was with you.”

“No. Ugh.” Catra rolls her eyes. “I know where she is.”

“The training grounds?” Bow and Glimmer say in unison. Catra nods.

Some habits die hard. Glimmer pats Catra on the shoulder and smiles at her, and in the dim light it’s hard to say how Catra responds, but she doesn’t tense at the touch, so it can’t be that bad. 

“Bring her back alive, please.”

“Hey, that is always the plan Sparkles, but you know her.”

Yes she does. They bid Catra goodnight, and make their way back to their room. By the time she gets there, sleep is tugging at her eyes, and even though she’s worried about what tomorrow will bring, she also knows there’s nothing to be done until it gets there. She can only hope Adora will eventually figure that out too.

**~~~~**

Adora’s breaths come in short, shallow gasps as she props herself up on her knees, the staff laying in the grass beside the target of her aggression. It’s a sack of barley inside a large pillowcase, tied haphazardly to a stake. The red smiley face she’d painted on it is almost unrecognizable. She tries to get her breathing under control, but to no avail, so is forced to remain hunched over like an old woman and wait.

Her goal had been to beat her way through her muddled thoughts and quiet her mind. Unfortunately, it hadn’t panned out that way. The more she’d thought about the implications of Entrapta’s discovery, the flashes she’d seen moments before passing out, and how quickly she’d lost She-Ra, the more forceful and less coordinated each strike had become. 

For the last half hour she’d slashed, punched, and even stabbed the hapless barley sack till her arms shook and her eyes burned. Finally, after a particularly wild swing she’d managed to unbalance herself and land flat on her back, knocking the wind out of her. Now she can do nothing but sit, wheeze, and wait for it to pass. At least her headache is gone.

Still though, it’s better than tossing and turning in her bed, right? Her pounding heart and tight, angry chest disagree. Groaning, she allows herself to flop backwards into the grass, staring up at the cloudy, starless night sky.

“What am I doing?” She whispers, as though the hidden stars might answer. 

Even as her muscles scream for mercy and her eyes beg for sleep, her mind still feels threatening, as if it’s just waiting for the pain of exertion to ease so that it can once again reclaim its hold on her. Logically, she knows training till she drops will probably have worse consequences than a sleepless night, but she is determined to keep her wicked thoughts at bay. With a heavy sigh, she reaches for the staff, and is about to push herself up when she hears a rustle from behind her. She yelps, and jumps to her feet leaving most of her blood somewhere by her knees. Her head pounds and her vision is obscured by a black fog. She gasps, staggering as she tries to catch herself.

_Damn it._

“Whoa, hey.”

She feels a sturdy hand on her shoulder, and as the black fog clears she can see that it’s Catra, leaning close, expression taut with worry. Not wanting to cause any more alarm today, Adora forces a smile, which promptly earns her a raised brow.

“Well that looks painful,” she mutters. “You look horrible. Want to tell me what’s going on?”

“I fell,” Adora grunts. “Got winded. I’ll be fine.”

“Oh, okay.”

A ringing silence follows this. Adora deflates, bending down to pick up the staff carefully, her head still pounding a little bit. Once she straightens up, she can see that Catra is watching her with crossed arms, her eyes narrowed and ears back. Adora’s gaze falls to her tail, the end of which is lashing back and forth. She looks away, rubbing her arm. Once more, their last conversation plays in her head and it sends another icy jet of adrenaline through her system. She has to say something. 

“Sorry,” she mumbles. “I can’t sleep.” Really?

“Yeah, figured as much.” Catra’s tone is sharp.

“Right. Uh…”

“Why didn’t you just tell me?” She says, and Adora knows she isn’t just talking about her bout of insomnia. 

“Catra --”

“What, did the years just slip away? Did you forget that little thing called therapy, all that talk about being open and straightforward? You seem to remember it just fine whenever I screw something up but now --”

“Hey, that’s not fair! I don’t expect you to be perfect.”

“Oh, great, glad we got that sorted out. I’ll just forget about all the nagging then.”

“Catra --”

“We’re supposed to be a team, we’re supposed to trust each other, tell each other things!”

“I know, I’m sorry!” Adora shouts, and they both flinch at the harsh volume of her voice and fall silent. She grimaces, tears burning in her eyes, but she forces them back and looks away for a moment before digging the heel of her palm into her forehead. She takes a deep breath. 

“I’m sorry,” She says, her tone gentler now and she lowers her hand, looking at Catra. Her tail has stilled. “I didn’t mean to keep anything from you. I was just confused, and overwhelmed. I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Another case for brain damage, huh?” Catra says softly, a faint smile tugging on her lips. “You need to stop fueling my anxiety.”

Adora chuckles. “I’m sorry.”

“You can stop apologizing too,” Catra says. “It’s okay. I…”

She hesitates for a moment, clearly mulling something over. “I’m sorry too. I should have given you more time, but I was…” Catra trails off, biting her lip and looking away from Adora. After a brief pause, she looks back at her again. “I was scared. I didn’t know what was wrong, and you were hiding something, and I didn’t know what to think so I just…”

“It’s okay,” Adora says. “We were both pretty freaked out.”

“And I think it’s safe to say you had the worse day.”

“I mean, it’s not a competition, but thanks.”

This earns her a small smile, and despite her exhaustion and worry, Adora feels warmth blooming in her chest replacing, the adrenaline and her shoulders and legs feel a bit less tight for a moment. 

“Seriously though, what good was all this?” Catra breaks the silence, nudging the mangled dummy with her toe. “What were you trying to do, train yourself unconscious?”

Adora shrugs, and Catra rolls her eyes.

“Of course you were. Now…are you going to tell me what happened and why you were so confused that you couldn’t talk to me?”

Adora sighs, and turns to Catra’s quizzical face. “I didn’t understand it at first. But at the party, right before I lost She-Ra, I --” She stops, her breath catching in her throat. Pain flares in her temple again, and in a hurry to catch herself she sits down, hand instinctively reaching to touch the spot before she can stop herself. She forces her panic down, trying instead to think of a way she can fend it off.

“Adora!”

Her vision blurs, but even as it does she notices that it’s not nearly as intense this time. Her thoughts are less muddled; the pain is annoying, not a blinding fireball. She can work with this. She feels Catra’s hand on her shoulder again as she crouches down beside her, and only then does Adora close her eyes.

She sees a planet -- a brilliant wash of green, blue, and white. Coming from one of the continents is a little train of ships. Adora leans forward to make it clearer, and realizes she can see a reflection of someone...a woman she doesn’t know. There is something familiar about her. A few numbers flash across the screen but disappear before Adora can study them. Now she is in a room, staring at what appears to be an air vent. Yet the sight isn’t important; it’s the voices; they’re muffled, like she’s underwater.

_“…Grayskull, squadron at the ready.”_

_“Go. Before she destroys --”_

There’s another flash and Adora gasps; she can hear Catra talking to her distantly but she tears her focus away to hear more. The scene changes, and she sees a large screen with numbers flashing across them and manages to pick a few out. The muffled voices meet her ears. Are they the same? She can’t tell.

_“...make it through!”_

_“Sir, there’s no telling where it will take us! And what of the Heart of Etheria?”_

_“The Heart of Etheria is --”_

The brightness disappears abruptly, and the world is shaking and dark, sirens blaring and she can barely see a thing. She strains to hear but catches the end of one last sentence. 

_“...power is yours to give.”_

It’s gone. She feels the slight discomfort of pressure, but nothing like the horrible vacuum that had sucked her into unconsciousness before. She exhales deeply, and opens her eyes. Catra is hovering right in front of her, hands cupping her face. Instinctively, she reaches up and places a hand over Catra’s.

“I’m okay.” She gasps in a hurry.

“What the hell, Adora?!” Catra snaps, and Adora can tell she’s shouting to keep her voice from shaking. Her eyes are rather bright as well. She does not move her hands, and Adora doesn’t press the matter. “What was that? I thought it was happening all over again!”

“No, I mean yes...it did, but no.” Adora gulps. “I saw what I saw before. Or at least, I think it was the same thing…” The words pour out in a rush. “Yes, it was. That’s what I hadn’t told you, I was going to tell you now, but then it hit me again and this time it was so much clearer. But it still only sort of makes sense.” 

Catra lowers her hands as she listens, looking alarmed, but Adora barrels on. “I need to write down what they said before I forget. I saw a planet, I heard voices...things that I can’t explain, things that aren’t my memories. Or at least, I don’t remember them. Maybe they are my memories. And I saw numbers...I don’t know why but they seemed important?” Adora hesitates. “Razz might be able to explain the visions...or memories, I don’t know. I need to go find her.” 

She staggers to her feet, ignoring her body’s furious dissenting.

“Hey, slow down!” Catra protests.

“Razz might know...Why didn’t I ever ask? Who is Grayskull, really?”

“Adora!”

“Where did these come from? Who put them there? Are they mine? How could --”

Catra smacks her in the face with a little more force than necessary. It does the job though, and Adora stills, flabbergasted for a moment then refocuses her attention back on her girlfriend. She’s looking at her like she’s grown an extra head. Adora’s hand drifts to where she was hit, cheek growing warm.

“Will you shut up?” Catra hisses.

“You hit me!” Adora says indignantly.

“You were freaking me out!”

Adora opens her mouth, and closes it again. She clears her throat.

“Okay yeah...that’s uh…that’s fair.”

Silence hangs in the air between them for a moment, and Catra pinches her brow and sighs, and after a few seconds of this she looks up at Adora again, expression weary.

“Okay, so...you saw visions, and heard voices?” 

“Yes.”

“Could you tell who?”

“No. I heard the word ‘Grayskull’ and...something about the Heart of Etheria. But they were broken up, I couldn’t decipher the whole meaning. I should write them down before I forget.”

“Here,” Catra produces a small notebook from her pocket. It fits neatly in the palm of her hand and has a tiny pencil that clips to the outside. Adora stares at it, expression blank, and Catra blushes. “What? I sketch sometimes - don’t look at me like that - just, write it down, okay? It…helps. And don’t you dare tell anyone!”

“I mean...okay...I wasn’t…” Adora bites her lip to hide her grin, eyes darting away from Catra’s withering gaze, and opens up the notebook. There are a few sketches of her on the first couple of pages, and Adora’s heart flutters momentarily - they’re actually quite good - several birds, a few unintelligible doodles, a few more birds, wow, there’s a _lot_ of birds…she forces herself not to look and flips through the remaining sketches until she finds a blank page, and begins to scribble furiously.

Once she’s done, she looks over it all and closes the notebook, handing it back to Catra again. 

“Thanks.”

“Yeah, sure. Is that all then?”

Adora sighs. “Yeah. I just, I didn’t know how to explain it without freaking you out. Having visions, passing out, and She-Ra…” She flinches at the name, her shoulders sagging. “What if I’m losing her?”

Catra frowns thoughtfully. “Honestly, if it keeps her from hurting you, I wouldn’t mind.” Adora can only stare, and Catra crosses her arms. “She-Ra is this superhuman, magical being with more power than any of us can fully understand, and that kind of power paints a huge target on her back. Maybe it isn’t something you’re supposed to keep forever. Maybe She-Ra is only meant to be around when there’s a real need and there just...isn’t anymore. The possible explanations aren’t all bad, you know. Have you stopped to consider you could just be yourself again?”

Adora continues staring, and Catra shakes her head, then says with a soft smile. “You were amazing before She-Ra, and you’ll be amazing long after.”

Adora blinks; she hadn’t considered this until now. She’s not sure if she’s ready to consider it. What would her life be like without She-Ra? Could she go back to being just Adora? Catra doesn’t seem to mind. Her cheeks feel suddenly warm.

“Yeah, okay,” She says after a moment. “That was really sweet, you know.”

“Well, sometimes it slips out. Don’t get used to it.” Catra punches her lightly in the least convincing way. 

Adora laughs, planting a kiss on her cheek and taking her hand as they make their way back to the castle. She feels lighter, less anxious. She has more information now, and with that comes more confidence; surely Entrapta will find something tomorrow. She carries it all the way back to their room, and by the time they settle in for the night, Adora is finally ready to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so the plot thickens!
> 
> Comment, kudos, the whole nine yards! Also thank you so so much to everyone who commented on the last two chapters. I get absolutely GIDDY just thinking about them, I won't lie I danced around my house after reading them. <3.
> 
> And hit me up on tumblr, library-of-crazy-221b.


	4. Wait, What?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Entrapta sciences the shit out of this problem.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good day all, thanks for your patience! We are back with chapter four. Thanks again to [Too_fucking_salty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Too_fucking_salty/pseuds/Too_fucking_salty) for being my test audience and in general shouting with me about writing. Truly an icon. Also, once again thank you to my lovely editor Jessica who needs to get a goddamn account on here but whatever.
> 
> Enjoy!

Catra cracks an eye open, peering into the dark room through her lashes, trying to discern what woke her up. Her ear twitches slightly at the distant sound of footsteps… _loud_ footsteps. She sighs, rolling onto her back. Definitely not worth being awake for. Adora shifts next to her with a sleepy groan. 

“Mmmm…somebody there?” She mumbles.

Catra smiles and rolls over, wrapping an arm around Adora’s torso and burying her face in the crook of her neck. She sighs, content, inhaling the faint scent of some kind of berry; Adora had managed to stumble through a shower last night, and the pleasant scent of her favorite shampoo still lingers.

“If there is, I don’t care.” Catra murmurs.

Adora hums with contentment, and Catra reciprocates with a steady purr, allowing her eyelids to drift closed once more. She can sense a chill in the morning air, but Adora has always been a space heater, and is an excellent remedy for just such an occasion. If they stay like this for the rest of the morning, she won’t complain.

_WHAM._

Catra jumps up with a shriek, bristling as she flies to the end of the bed, claws unsheathed and ready to face whatever threat just burst into their room. She can feel Adora lurch upright beside her, and as she blinks herself awake, she realizes the figure in the doorway is no danger. However, she is _in_ danger. At least, in Catra’s mind she is.

“Entrapta!” Catra barks. “Why…can’t you _knock?!”_

“I’ve got it!” Entrapta shouts.

Catra stares at her blankly.

“What?” Adora croaks.

Entrapta is bouncing up and down on her hair. She looks like she might burst with excitement, wringing her hands together and staring intently at Adora with wide eyes. It takes a few more seconds for the meaning to dawn on Catra, but Adora beats her to the realization, her eyes lighting up and she swings her feet to the floor.

“Entrapta, did you find something last night?” She asks hurriedly.

 _“Yes!_ I know what’s causing this, I just need you to confirm it!”

Rushing forward, Entrapta wraps a wad of hair around Adora’s wrist, pulling her off the bed before Catra (who still hasn’t come down from the adrenaline rush) can protest. Now that there is no imminent danger, she falls back onto the bed with a groan. So much for a cozy morning in. It hadn’t been a real option in the first place, but Catra could dream.

“Okay, I’m coming, slow down Entrapta,” Adora chides, fighting long enough to grab her jacket before she’s dragged from the room. She glances back at Catra. “I guess I’ll see you in a bit?”

“Yeah.” Catra waves her off; Entrapta will inevitably want to wake up the entire castle before divulging her findings since she won’t want to repeat herself, giving Catra a few minutes to gather her thoughts and put on real clothes. Meanwhile Adora is still in the knitted Swift Wind sweater Castaspella had given her last year, topped off with her dumb red jacket (At least she finally ditched the hair poof. Change comes slowly with Adora.)

The pair of them disappear through the door, and Catra takes another deep breath, rubbing her face and hauling herself off the bed to get dressed. She makes a mental note to grab Adora something to eat on her way to the lab. As she shuffles to the closet, her foot makes contact with a rumpled black mass; her suit jacket from the previous evening. She must have discarded it in her haste to change and get to bed. Knowing Adora will probably tease her for it later, she scoops it up off the floor and goes to hang it up.

There’s a soft thud as something heavier than a button clips the side of the closet door. Frowning, she pauses and digs out a small wooden box from the pocket. She stares at it for a moment. Where has she seen this before? It’s important, but she can’t remember why. Then, as the last bit of sleep is dislodged from her groggy synapses, it clicks, and she opens it. Inside is a small, golden, wing-shaped pin. Right after the whole...She-Ra incident, Catra had found it on the floor where Adora had fallen and stowed it in her pocket before following her to the infirmary. After that…well, she hadn’t spared a thought for it had she?

Now she wonders why Adora had it in a box of all places. Why had she stopped wearing it? What was she carrying it around for? Shaking her head, she closes the box, returns it to the pocket and hangs the jacket back up where it belongs. She’ll have to deal with it later. There are more pressing matters to worry about right now than Adora’s odd jewelry habits. Although, as she leaves her room she can’t help but smirk; she might just have an idea for how to give it back. 

**…**

“Is everyone here?”

Catra glances around the room at Entrapta’s question; true to her suspicion, more than half of Brightmoon seems to have been stirred by her wake up call. Even Micah is here, although there’s usually a council meeting at this time (Catra doesn’t attend it typically; who has a meeting at 0700?) so it makes sense. The only difference is that in place of the meeting table is a makeshift lab that Entrapta must have set up overnight. She usually keeps some equipment in Brightmoon for visits, but it appears she brought half her Fright Zone lab with her for this occasion.

“Everyone is here, Entrapta; go ahead,” Micah calls out. He’s one of the few people not still in sleepwear. 

Catra shuffles over to stand by Adora, who’s a few feet behind the monitor Entrapta has gathered them around. She’s got her arms tightly folded across her chest, fingers digging into her upper arms, bunching up the wool sweater so that Swift Wind’s face is incredibly distorted. There are shadows under her eyes, and her jaw is set as she watches Entrapta. Catra attempts to pry a few of her fingers loose, and without looking, Adora takes her hand. Catra snorts softly.

“No,” She whispers. “Open.”

“Hm?” Adora mutters, distracted. 

Catra detangles their fingers, and shoves the scone into her hand. 

“Here. Eat.”

“Oh.” Adora turns to her, tired blue eyes brightening as she gives her a warm smile and takes a bite. “Thanks.”

“Okay!” Entrapta says, clapping her hands together. “I was monitoring the probes last night and made some modifications to the setup. I found this!”

She points to the monitor, and Catra is squashed into Adora’s arm with a grunt as Scorpia leans over her to get a better look. 

“Scorpia,” Catra grunts.

“Oh, sorry Catra! Tea?”

She holds up a cup of her signature soothing tea.

“Where did you…? You know what, sure.”

Catra takes it and goes back to squinting at the monitor. Her data reading skills have never been a high priority, especially with people like Bow and Entrapta around to interpret it for her. So, instead of trying to make sense of the mass of points clumped together on the screen, she stares pointedly at Entrapta, who takes a deep breath.

“The offset theory was false because the energy spike happened again last night and I discovered it was a radio frequency wave which means it’s impossible for it to be Etheria’s magic as I would have seen it before so She-Ra is most likely reacting to a deep space signal that has a resonance pattern or specific frequency She-Ra is sensitive to and based on the coordinates and data Adora received last night it appears this signal might be an attempt to communicate with her directly and if I can monitor her I can determine if the signal is still out there and triangulate its origin if it is!”

A long silence follows this speech. Catra’s heart is pounding, but she is the first to recover and finish processing what she heard. Her voice comes out far more confident than she actually feels.

“I’m not sure which is more impressive, Entrapta saying all of that in one breath or the fact that I actually caught most of it. What was that you said about its origin?”

“For those of us with less astute hearing,” Micah says evenly, “Entrapta, could you reiterate that a little more slowly?”

Entrapta sighs. “This waveform —” She gestures to the monitor. “Is unique. There are thousands of radio waves flying through space and even on Etheria, but _this one_ took down She-Ra. If I can study it while it is still active and Adora is She-Ra, I can track it, and I can determine if it lines up with the coordinates Adora received last night.”

“Why didn’t it send her back to the infirmary?” Glimmer asks.

“Somehow it resonates with She-Ra’s energy signature; it essentially overloaded her internal circuitry. Now Adora isn’t very powerful in her human form, but she’s bonded to She-Ra so the signal still has an impact, the effects just aren’t so drastic.”

“I am powerful…” Adora mutters under her breath, and Catra has to stifle a giggle. She gives her a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.

“Okay,” Bow says slowly. “So how are you sure it is the same signal?”

“Because the two reactions are similar, just an order of magnitude apart in strength. I can also prove it by overlaying the data I got in the Fright Zone and removing the so-called ‘offset.’” She hits a few buttons, and two new data points appear on the graph, well above the others. “You can see the difference, and if you look at this slope, it doesn’t appear to match up. But when you remove the thirty-eight microseconds…”

She hits another button, and the data points move. For some reason this is significant, because Bow gasps.

“Oh!” He says, eyes shining with excitement. “It’s a propagation delay!”

“Yes! And if you take the derivative of the new data and multiply…”

Catra loses interest as Entrapta and Bow rattle off about mathematical methods, and turns her attention back to Adora. She looks a million miles away, staring at the monitor like it holds every secret in the universe. She’s about to ask her what she’s thinking when they are interrupted by another voice.

“Hold up, I have a question.”

Everyone turns to see Netossa eying them all with a frown.

“If somebody wanted to contact She-Ra, why didn’t they just…show up?” A ringing silence follows this, and she scoffs. “I mean, she traveled all over the universe for nearly two years. She’s not exactly a secret. So why couldn’t they just send a message normally, or visit?”

“Well,” Bow ventures. “Not every system has space transport yet. Or advanced communication systems.”

“So they blast a She-Ra specific radio signal across space?” Micah asks. “Netossa has a good point. How would somebody even know it would reach She-Ra? Who has that kind of knowledge?”

Adora goes rigid, brow furrowing. “The First Ones.”

“But the First Ones abandoned this planet over a thousand years ago,” Entrapta says with a frown. “And they have not been seen since. Perhaps somebody was studying you without your knowledge. Or it’s old First One’s tech acting up out in space! Maybe prototype tech to control She-Ra for the Heart of Etheria project. I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“I like the second,” Adora says with a fervent nod. “First one doesn’t make any sense, what motive would somebody have for doing that?”

“Because they want to hurt She-Ra,” Catra says, her tone bordering on irritated. Adora gulps, and Catra’s expression turns grim; she hates the idea as much as anyone else, but refuses to let it be a reason to sweep it aside. “She’s a force to be reckoned with, somebody is bound to want her out of the picture.”

“Hmm, possibly,” Entrapta muses. “Though now that I’m thinking of it, that kind of knowledge would be difficult to get hold of, especially without being detected. I think the second option is more likely here.”

“Okay, so are we going to do an experiment to figure this out?” Glimmer asks. “Because if we can track the signal we can probably answer a lot of these questions. Adora?”

“Yes,” Adora says with a nod. “Let’s do it.”

**~~~~**

“Wait!”

Adora can feel her jaw muscles twitching, fighting the urge to scream with frustration. Why can’t they just get this over with? This is the third interruption, Perfuma being the offending voice, and she flinches as Adora levels her with a withering stare.

“Sorry! I just forgot to mention that I’ll catch you. That is, if you fall again.”

Adora glances down at the vines lying in wait on the floor around her. She can’t hold onto her irritation, not when Perfuma is looking at her with such compassion and concern, so she smiles.

“Thanks, Perfuma.”

“All right, you ready Adora?” Entrapta chirps. 

Adora nods, taking a deep breath. With all eyes in the room watching her anxiously from a safe distance, Adora’s already shaky confidence in what they’re about to do gets weaker. It would be nice if somebody seemed confident. She feels like she should start singing, or crack a joke. Yet nothing appropriate for the situation comes to mind. Her eyes find Catra, who gives her a reassuring smile, and just like that the tension eases. Adora returns the smile, then turns her attention back to Entrapta.

“All right, everyone at the ready! I’ve got the recording equipment primed, Bow, Mermista, mind the power supply and Scorpia be ready to assist if there’s a surge. I’ll count you off, timing is everything here! Three...two...one… now!”

“For the honor of Grayskull!” 

Anxiety gnaws at her mind, but Adora forces it aside, reaching for the sword she knows is there. It flickers momentarily, but appears, and as she steps into the form of She-Ra, it’s the same comfortable glow as always. The transformation complete, she lowers the sword and braces herself both mentally and physically, squinting with anticipation despite her desire to remain stoic. As the minutes creep by without any pain or hint of a vision, Adora’s heart slows, and she releases a breath she didn’t realize she’s been holding.

“Seeing anything?” Glimmer calls out. Entrapta doesn’t respond immediately, her purple eyes darting back and forth across the screen.

“Not yet…” she murmurs. 

The experiment is extremely uneventful, probably the most tedious one Adora has ever seen, let alone been a part of. She has electrodes attached to her, mostly on her head, and it all bears an unsettling resemblance to Horde Prime. Catra had been the first to point this out, and as Adora glances her way again she can see her fidgeting with her hands, eyes fixed on Adora but not in an attempt to make eye contact. She seems to be waiting.

Tearing her eyes away from Catra, she searches the room for something to distract her. The room is filled with a sea of anxious eyes, so she turns her attention to Brightmoon’s vaulted ceiling instead. The elegant chandelier is enticing, glittering in the morning sunlight; could she jump high enough to touch it? It’s a tempting notion, but it would rip the electrodes off; Entrapta wouldn’t appreciate that. She’d probably make Adora do the whole thing all over again, which is the only thing worse than doing it now.

It already took an hour to set the whole experiment up; of course included in that time had been consoling a hysterical Swift Wind, who’d burst in saying he’d nearly fallen out of the sky over Brotheria last night and had come as quickly as possible. She still feels terrible for causing him distress, but after much reassuring and promise of apples, she was able to convince him to stand quietly.

...Or at least, for about five minutes. 

“Do you see anything yet?” He asks, peering over Entrapta’s shoulders, his eyes bugging as he watches anxiously. Entrapta ignores him.

“What about now?”

“Swift Wind!” Adora hisses through her teeth.

“What? I just want to know.”

Scorpia interjects, reaching over and wrapping an arm around his neck, shoving him back. “Entrapta needs her space!”

Swift Wind starts to squirm in protest.

“AHAH!” Entrapta shrieks. Everyone freezes, Scorpia with her arms still around Swift Wind’s neck, and the latter suddenly still as a statue with his leg wrapped around Scorpia’s torso. “THERE! Bow, do you see it?! Do you see?” She seizes him by the collar and drags him over to the monitor with a yelp.

He squints at it for a moment, and his eyes widen. “Oh!”

“What?” Adora starts to make her way to the monitor but lurches to a stop as she reaches the end of her attachments. _Stupid..._

Entrapta and Bow are completely absorbed by the screen. It casts a flickering light against their faces, a tantalizing glow of hidden information. The rest of the group crowds around the monitor as well, so that Adora alone is left in the dark. Nobody says anything, but Bow and Entrapta are whispering to each other rapidly. Adora is overcome by a sudden urge to climb out of her skin. Her eyes glow brightly for a moment.

“Hey!” She shouts, She-Ra’s powerful voice filling the room, and multicolored sparks fly from the end of the sword. “Somebody care to fill me in?”

A moment of silence follows this before Catra clears her throat quietly. Adora glances her way to see her looking down at the floor, cheeks flushed, and has to force back a smirk.

“I found it! The signal is still there, it’s just very weak. Look,” Entrapta turns the monitor around for Adora to see, though Adora makes little sense of it. “Now, Scorpia, give me more power so we can trace it! Right at that inlet there!”

Scorpia obliges. “Stand back everyone!”

She electrocutes the power supply, and it, along with most of the equipment, glows brightly. Entrapta holds up what looks like an antenna with a strange hilt and attaches it to a port on the monitor. It begins to spin rapidly, and Entrapta looks back at the screen.

“Bow! The numbers!”

Bow scurries over with his trackpad. “The ones Adora gave me, right?”

“Yes,” Entrapta says, eyes zipping between screens. “YES! I’ve got it! They _are_ coordinates, look, the first half is there, and…and…” she trails off, the smile fading and she squints at the monitor. “Huh. Well it’s the same sector, but not the same location.” She gestures to Bow, who leans in as well. “See? This is the origin of the signal, but it doesn’t match the coordinates.”

“Huh,” Bow says with a frown. He squints. “Well it’s old data, the source may have moved over time. It has been a thousand years. Hey, do you see that?”

“See what…? Oh! Interesting. I think it’s a ghost.” 

“What’s that?”

“It’s like when you place your hand against a cold glass and it leaves an imprint behind for a little while! Except the boosted signal is the hand, and the monitor is the glass! Only thing is, I can’t tell for sure if it’s in sync or not.” Entrapta scratches her chin with her hair. “Hmm…I’m going to need to study this but you guys should get going soon!”

Adora’s heart jumps.

“Wait, what?” Catra says sharply. Entrapta stares at her like she’s missing something obvious.

“Well, you have to go find it...for science! And for Adora!”

“Yeah!” Bow shouts, punching the air.

“Yeah!” Scorpia echoes.

Adora frowns.

“Okay, but what if I get close to it and it…” she says, and She-Ra’s form flickers and shrinks to herself again. “…goes off?”

Bow and Scorpia deflate.

“Oh, right.” Entrapta ponders this a moment and then snaps her fingers. “Give me till the morning and I’ll have something made up that will help!” She sets off to work again, darting around her lab like an exuberant, genius jackrabbit. She pauses to look at them all. “Well, shouldn’t you be getting ready?”

“Whoa, Entrapta we need a plan,” Glimmer says.

“We have a plan, apparently,” Catra grunts irritably. “Go to this location. Find whatever it is, shut it down, and get the hell back here.”

“Precisely, Catra!” Entrapa chirps. “You can take Darla! She has a laser cannon now!”

“A laser cannon?” Bow’s voice rises in pitch, and it’s difficult to say whether he’s impressed or horrified. Perhaps it’s both.

“Well that would have been nice about two and a half years ago,” Adora mutters under her breath, and Catra snorts. “Okay, so Catra, Bow, Glimmer and I can all take Darla. How far away is it?”

“Uh…” Entrapta pauses, eyes flicking up as she does rapid-fire calculations in her head. “About three days away! Pick up whatever you can and bring it back. We should be able to maintain communication in the meantime and I can update you on anything new.”

“Aw man!” Frosta whines. “Why do they always get to go to space?”

“They don’t ‘always get to go to space,’ Frosta. They’ve been twice. But, they’ve also spent the most time there,” Netossa says crossly. “They know what they’re doing.”

“Okay, but consider this: I want to go to space.”

“Hey Frosta, you’ll get your chance,” Micah says, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Not this time though, Kiddo.”

“Stop calling me that, I’m eighteen!”

“If it makes you feel better Frosta, I’m twenty-four and he still calls me ‘Baby Girl,’” Glimmer says with a pointed eye-roll in her father’s direction. “Anyway, let’s get going on preparations, I’d like to head out by this time tomorrow.”

“Agreed,” Adora says quickly; the sooner they can get on their way, the better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you go! Time to go to sPACE. I love space. probably too much. I'm a bit like Entrapta.
> 
> Love to hear your thoughts, comments welcome and loved. Come say hi at my tumblr: [library-of-crazy-221b](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Going forward I have a few chapters written up ahead, and I'll see about keeping up with maybe once a week, or possibly once every other week. I want to keep a few chapters queued up though because I am planning to work on this project for NaNoWriMo this November (for those of you who don't know, that's national novel writing month, 50k in one month) so anything new I write probably won't get edited or polished till December, and I don't want to leave you all hanging that long!
> 
> Cheers, and thanks to everyone who's commented and left kudos so far, you are all treasures <3.
> 
> PS: yes the run on sentence can be said in one breath and is still understandable. I know because I did it. Out loud.


	5. Aris

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh look, another chapter! This one's a shorty. Was going to wait but then it was just sitting there. Staring at me. So I decided to post it. This one is quite a bit different than my other chapters so far, and is one of my tags coming true. Don't have much else to say, so enjoy!

“Commander, you’re required in the General’s office.”

A long pause follows this announcement, and for a moment it appears the woman being addressed did not hear. The officer clears his throat awkwardly, and at long last she turns her chair towards him. Her face is lined, both from weariness and age. White streaks her long dark hair, which is pulled taught in a braid. Her uniform is black with gilded lining, and she wears a golden headpiece that wraps elegantly around her ears and the back of her head. She sighs.

“Again?” She muses. “He’s already found She-Ra, what more does he need from me?”

“There’s been a development.”

A brow creeps up towards her hairline. “A development, you say? Well, that settles it then.”

She gets to her feet, posture rigid, and levels the junior officer with a hard stare, sharp brown eyes boring into his; there’s a reason she’s maintained her office this long. He jumps to a salute, and after surveying him for a moment, her expression softens. She nods to him.

“At ease,” she says evenly, “I’m on my way.”

Marching past him, she allows him to close the door behind her and makes her way down the long hallway to the General’s office. The Aris Base isn’t exactly a maze, but every hallway, door, and hologram projector looks nearly the same: angular writing flashing on screens, a faint blue glow from the lights on the ceiling, and the same robotic projections ready to dispense information if one has the clearance. Asking a hologram is the only way an unfamiliar soul could find their way around, and it’s muscle memory that brings her to her destination. She waits outside patiently until she hears a muffled “Enter” from within and opens the door. 

The room is large enough to be somebody’s quarters, except the left half is filled with equipment. A myriad of machines, computers, and indiscernible experiments line the walls and cover the floor in what appears to be vaguely ordered chaos. The office is one of the few on the base with a window to the outside world, but only a sliver of the arid desert is visible, obscured by a large cabinet that has been moved to make way for the machinery. It might have been interesting if there hadn’t been a person strapped to an upright table with various electrodes attached to their body in the center of the room. The subject is a magicat, his grey and white fur bristled and damp with sweat. His ear twitches at the new arrival, but otherwise he does not react. 

“Commander Artana.”

Standing several feet away from the test subject is a man with blond hair wearing a crisp, black uniform trimmed extensively in gold. His gaze lingers on the screen for a moment before he taps it a few times, and the distant whine of a motor spooling down can be heard. He steps away from the monitor, hitting a few switches on a nearby panel as he does, and his test subject gasps and relaxes, released from whatever torment was being inflicted on him. The General turns to face Artana and smiles; his features are soft, making him appear younger than he actually is. The expression would even be friendly if only it managed to reach his pale blue eyes. Artana offers him a salute, though it’s not nearly as snappy as the one she received earlier. 

“You know, magicats have a rather deceiving name,” he says after a moment. His voice is even, almost monotone. “Nothing. Not an ounce of magic in this creature.”

He shakes his head, peering down at the creature thoughtfully. “But what about your own energy? Surely you have something you can give.” 

The magicat does not respond, breathing as though he’d just run a dozen miles, his eyes closed.

“General,” Artana says as though he hadn’t spoken. “I hear there is new information.”

“Yes,” he says briskly, gaze snapping to her, eyes boring into hers with such intensity one could mistaken it for insanity. “Do you know who has had access to the command room in the last eight hours?”

“I could look it up for you, Sir, but I was in there a few hours ago, as was Officer Gerhard,” Artana says, unperturbed. 

“Were you aware of another transmission?”

“To where, Etheria?”

The corner of his lip twitches ever so slightly. “Yes.”

“I was, I thought you had ordered it. Did you not?”

“No, I did not. Of the two soldiers and one officer in the room at the time, none of them appear to have attempted to make contact. It seems that the transmitter started up all by itself.”

“I see.” She frowns. “I could run diagnostics to see if there was a malfunction. What did it send?”

“Well, it used the same settings, except She-Ra was not active, so it only sent fragmented data to the host.”

“Ah, so no harm done it would seem. You don’t think she could interpret it, could she? If anything it may be furthering our goal to disrupt her connection to She-Ra.”

He sighs, a twitch of frustration on his face, but he keeps it out of his tone. “In theory, yes. But I would hate for her to comprehend its meaning. Without She-Ra, the signal does very little damage, yet might even remain ingrained in her mind. Surely you can understand why I would like to avoid that?”

“Understood, General,” Artana says with a tilt of her head. “Although isn’t your goal to draw her out?”

There’s a short pause, and the General smiles again, though this time there’s nothing friendly about it.

“Carefully, Commander,” he says in a soft voice. “Now if you could run some diagnostics and report back to me when you are finished, I would very much appreciate it. Also, send Commander Quill in, if you don’t mind. I’m going to put him in charge of this creature once we’re done here.”

“What are your plans for it?” The magicat cracks an eye open at the woman. His tail twitches ever so slightly.

“Run a few more tests, see if we can’t siphon a different form of energy. And then we will…release it.”

She nods, granting him a salute before making her way back outside. Her eyes drift briefly to the prisoner again as she walks out. Amber meets brown, and he bares his teeth. A low, threatening snarl rumbles in his throat, and Artana merely narrows her eyes before looking away and stepping through the door. The halls are unusually quiet but for the distant hum of equipment. She makes a few different turns, heading not to her office but the command room. She does not bother announcing herself. 

“Gerhard!” She snaps. A young officer, in a uniform similar to the General’s but with no gold, jumps to his feet and spins to face Artana. 

“Ma’am,” He says hurriedly. “Uh, can I help you?”

“I need to run diagnostics on the main transmit circuit,” she says. “Prep it for me.”

“Yes Ma’am,” He says, dashing out of the room. 

Before sitting down, she opens her comm link. “Officer Quill, this is Commander Artana; General Grayskull would like to see you in his office.”

_“Yes Commander, I’m on my way.”_

Artana sits in front of the main monitor and begins setting things up on her end, removing her earpiece and disabling it carefully before turning her attention to the screen. She works quickly and silently. There’s a beep on the screen in front of her that indicates Gerhard’s done his job and disconnected from the main power supply, so she begins rerouting to the room’s isolated supply for a controlled setup. Then, she reboots. The lights flicker, and as Gerhard re-enters the room she turns to him with a frown. He stares at her expectantly, and she sighs, her exasperation seeping onto her face. 

“The door, Gerhard,” she grunts, pointing. 

“Oh, oops.” He closes the door behind him, and the ambient noise from the hallways disappears. 

“You get confirmation?” She asks. 

“Yes, our audio signal is being dumped, nothing is being recorded.”

She nods, and then melts into the chair, like it’s been weeks since she’s allowed even her posture to slide. Gerhard takes a chair next to her, his innocent, eager gaze waiting for her to do something, but Artana seems lost in thought. After a few long seconds, she returns to the present. 

“Sorry,” she says. “We have limited time so I should not waste it. We need to send another one, and this time the coordinates need to be complete.”

“Are you sure about that? How do you know she understood the last ones?”

“I don’t, but Grayskull is suspicious, so we need to get to the point quickly.”

“Whoa, Artana, er, Commander, we got this far because we fragmented the recordings enough so that it would look like garbage to anyone not actively trying to decrypt it. If you send her something complete, he’s bound to know.”

“I know, but I don’t think he suspects me yet, which means he suspects others, possibly even you, and I can’t have anyone else falling on my behalf.” She sighs, rubbing her temple, and Gerhard frowns at her but says nothing. “And he still thinks the third transmission I rerouted through Eternia was just a ghost signal, which means the Etherians definitely will. We have to do one more and it has to be clear.”

“But if he notices — which he will — he’ll just decrypt it; we’ll be sending She-Ra into a trap.”

At this, a knowing smile blooms on Artana’s face, and she clicks her tongue impatiently. 

“Gerhard,” she sighs. “Where is your faith? Did you forget that I helped orchestrate the biggest technological failure in Eternian history?”

“No, of course not.”

“A quick lesson for you, Gerhard. One cannot decrypt a signal if they have nothing to decrypt with.”

“What are you going to do, blow it up?”

Artana frowns thoughtfully, as though she is seriously considering the option. Then she rolls her eyes. “No. There isn’t a single point failure big enough. Besides, I’d rather not blast us all into oblivion. Call me old fashioned I suppose.” She shakes her head. “No, I’ve modified the virus Mara installed in Light Hope. It’s a bit more...insidious. It’ll be a nightmare to track down, should give us a few extra days, weeks if I do it right.”

“Are you sure it’s worth the risk?”

“The project is moving too quickly. At this rate, by the time Adora has any clue what’s going on, it could be too late and…” she takes a deep breath. “I refuse to take that chance. It’ll take me several hours to set it all up. They’re doing a test on the shield tomorrow afternoon, I can do it then but you’ll have to send the signal before that. Make sure you use my account information. Maybe even throw a complete recording in there since I’m cashing in on all my luck at once anyway.” She turns to him. “Can you do that?”

Gerhard nods, but then frowns. “Yes...but what if you get caught?”

Artana chuckles. “Oh, I can guarantee you I will be caught. But...if I play my cards right — and I usually do — I should have a ride. Don’t worry about me, worry about getting that signal out, and staying safe.” 

The junior officer sighs, bouncing his knee slightly as he thinks. He frowns up at his commanding officer. “That’s a lot of data, it’ll take a lot of power to get it to her.”

“Yes, it will,” Artana glances at the monitor to see the progress bar is nearing completion. Gerhard shifts, expression taut with worry.

“Even if she’s not She-Ra, that could cause her considerable...well...distress. To put it lightly.”

“Will it kill her?”

“No…”

“Will it cause permanent damage?”

He hesitates. “I don’t think so. But I can’t be sure.”

“Well….try not to prolong it longer than necessary. If she’s anything like Mara…” she pauses, a wistful smile on her face. “Then she’s strong enough to take it.”

The monitor beeps, indicating the test is done. 

“Time elapsed, five minutes exactly,” Gerhard says briskly. “I’ll have diagnostics sent to engineering.”

“Excellent,” Artana replies. “I’ll review it here as well, and double check the connections in case we need to run it again.” She re-enables her comm link, and replaces it in her ear.

Gerhard nods and exits, leaving his senior officer alone in the command room. Her head’s a little higher, eyes a little brighter. Mara’s efforts would continue, and they would not be in vain; not if she has anything to say about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yep! I said there'd be original characters, and here be the original characters. Would love to hear thoughts, initial impressions, anything really so hit me up in the comments. Also, I will keep with Adora/Glimmer/Catra POV for the majority of the fic. We'll be getting scenes like this every so often for plot clarity and whatnot, but this isn't a big switch lol.
> 
> Or, as per usual, pester me on tumblr, I don't bite. [look, it me](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Update: just putting a second note in here but changed my username to dem_bones.


	6. Not to Be Dramatic, But We're Screwed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wuh oh.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hallo! We are back. This took longer than I thought it would, but I achieved my goal of getting these idiots to space before 20k lol. Fairly long chapter this time, and thanks to my lovely editor Jessica who keeps me honest and helps fix some of my more... _interesting_ phrasings.
> 
> Anyway, enjoy!

“Wait! Your Majest — ah, Glimmer!”

“Scorpia, I’m really busy right now, can it wait?”

“Right, um, so Perfuma told me to come and find you because some supplies just came in from Alwyn.”

Glimmer whips around so fast that Scorpia jumps back a step, laughing nervously. 

“What do you mean?” She asks sharply. “I already received them last night.”

Scorpia scratches the back of her head. “Yeah uh, Perfuma said they were delivered on King Micah’s orders.”

Violence. That is what Glimmer feels in that moment and she closes her eyes, taking a deep breath. She opens them again to find Scorpia staring at her intently.

“Where did he have them delivered?”

“Well, Castaspella was there to greet them, so she had them delivered to the gardens.”

Glimmer counts to ten slowly. She doesn’t have time for this. Or patience. How did Casta come to that conclusion? 

“How much did he order?” Glimmer groans. 

“An extra week’s worth of rations, as well as fresh fruit and vegetables which I was a little confused by because--”

“Too low in nutrition,” Glimmer finishes for her. “What, does he think I’m five? Just...have Perfuma load them on Darla with everything else.”

“Oh, that’s actually Catra’s job. Perfuma told me because the supplies are squashing her sunflowers.”

“Then have Catra do it. I need to pack.”

“Oh...right, uh, yeah she’s actually helping Bow with the final checks on Darla.”

Glimmer closes her eyes again. “Then find _somebody_ to help you load them…”

“I’ll get right on that!”

“Thank you Scorpia! Oh, and if Aunt Casta comes looking for me, tell her I’m in my office.”

As Scorpia acknowledges her request, Glimmer teleports outside Adora and Catra’s room, her mind reeling. She’s already stressed enough trying to plan a space mission in twenty-four hours, and now, mere hours before they’re set to leave, she has yet another headache. Glancing at the doorway, she’s surprised to find it open, and to see Adora rummaging fervently through drawers. Glimmer’s fury with her family is momentarily forgotten, and she steps into the room. 

“Adora? What are you doing? Aren’t you packed already?”

Adora freezes like she’s been caught red handed, looking over at her and smiles once she realizes who it is. Glimmer is amazed by how guilty her friend can look, especially given that her only crime is being over prepared.

“Oh, yeah, I’m just double checking that I didn’t forget anything,” she says, before resuming her rummaging again. 

Her nervous energy reminds Glimmer of something, and she steps into the room. 

“Hey,” Glimmer steps closer. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Adora says slowly. “Just...don’t want to forget anything.”

Glimmer glances to the three perfectly packed travel bags on the floor, and then back to Adora again.

“It’ll be fine,” she says reassuringly. Adora smiles. 

“Thanks. I’ll feel better when we’re on the ship.”

“Yeah,” Glimmer bites her lip, and Adora tilts her head at her curiously. “So, I was just wondering...what ever happened to the box?”

Adora droops immediately, and before she can say anything more Glimmer reacts, her stomach sinking.

“Do you still have it? Are you guys okay?”

“No, I mean, yes, I mean…” Adora sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. “We’re fine. I lost the box in the Fright Zone. I tried to go back and look before we left but...no luck.”

The explanation is both a relief and a letdown; the pin had been a gift from Brightmoon when Adora joined the rebellion as She-Ra. She’d worn it almost every day since, making it a perfect engagement token. Glimmer refuses to accept it might be lost, so she smiles reassuringly and places a hand on Adora’s shoulder. 

“We’ll find it when we get back. It has to show up somewhere.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Adora says, giving her a gallant smile. 

“I know I’m right,” Glimmer says firmly. Adora’s smile gets a little brighter. 

“Thanks. What are you doing right now? Do you need help packing?”

“Ugh, that would be great, actually,” Glimmer groans. 

“Uh oh,” Adora’s smile turns sympathetic. “What’s been happening?”

“Well,” Glimmer begins, and then puts on her best impression of her Aunt’s voice. “‘I’m just not sure why you aren’t bringing more people. I mean, if it were my mission I would want as much experience as possible. But what do I know, I’m not a queen like you, no need to take my word for anything.’ Ugh, she’s the worst, and don’t get me started on how ‘helpful’ my Dad has been…”

Glimmer continues to fill her in as they make their way to her room, and Adora listens, nodding sagely once they arrive. 

“Yeah, Swift Wind was going nuts yesterday afternoon; he was worried about losing his mind and kept demanding Entrapta give him the tech too.”

“I just…” Glimmer sighs. “Why can’t they take me seriously? Do they think I can’t do my job?”

“They’re trying to help,” Adora offers. “I know Casta is...a _lot_ , but I think both her and your dad want everything to go smoothly with this mission, and they want to see you home safely, so they’re just doing what they can to help. It just...hasn’t turned out to be very helpful.”

“Yeah, I suppose so,” Glimmer mumbles as she starts rummaging around her room for necessary items and tossing them in a bag.

“Hey, you’re a good Queen, Glimmer,” Adora says firmly, and she begins organizing Glimmer’s things as they’re tossed her way.

Glimmer wants to believe she’s as good as Adora says. Yet Catra knew the princesses were in Brightmoon before she did. Her father, supposed to be retired now, keeps trying to ‘help’ her. None of the signs are pointing to her competency. However, her own woes are not worth the trouble right now.

“Thanks,” she says, then backtracks. “So, is Swift Wind in any danger from this signal?”

“Entrapta doesn’t think so,” Adora says. “He didn’t pass out or have any visions, he just reacted to me.”

“But she found a way to block it?”

Adora chuckles. “Bow made a helmet thing, he was very proud of it. But Entrapta said she just needed to make a few adjustments to Darla’s shielding and it will block out signals twice as powerful as the first one I was hit with.”

Glimmer can imagine Bow’s disappointment, and makes a mental note to cheer him up later. Maybe she can sneak the last of the cake on board.

“I mean, it does work,” Adora says. “It’s just not very practical for this mission. It’s going to good use though…Swift Wind has it.”

“Oh, I _need_ to see this.”

“It doesn’t fit on his head. But it makes him feel better.”

They both dissolve into a sleep-deprived fit of giggling before Glimmer straightens up and surveys her packing job.

“Okay,” she says. “Anything else you think I need?”

Adora scans the room. “No. I think you’re okay. I packed extra necessities just in case.”

“Of course you did.”

Glimmer wasn’t all that worried to begin with since both Bow and Adora always over-pack for any trip, no matter the distance. It is both endearing and annoying, but given her own packing habits and Catra’s inability to do so (”Why bother when Adora brings three of everything?”) it all balances out in the end.

“Oh, yeah,” she says. “I’ll have my Dad load up the extra supplies, so we have two and a half weeks’ rations now. Figured it was better than sending them back.”

Adora perks up at this. “Good!”

“Yes, so now by the logic of space travel we are prepared; we have two and a half times the rations we need so everything will go smoothly and I’ll have to figure out what to do with it.”

“Uh, Glimmer that’s not —”

“No!” Glimmer puts a finger on Adora’s lips. “It is because I said so.”

It damn well better be. 

****

~~~~

****

Adora yawns, standing up and stretching after several hours of flicking through charts on the monitor in her room, dozing, and even going so far as to inventory their supplies to fend off boredom. 

The launch had been quite uneventful; after two years of space travel, Catra had become quite the accomplished pilot, something Adora was both proud and jealous of. Once they’d cleared Etheria’s atmosphere, Catra had offered to take first watch and man the autopilot. With Bow off to finish some tasks Entrapta had given him, and Glimmer hitting her room for a much needed nap, Adora had been left on her own. She should have been sleeping since she was second watch, but she had been too wired for that.

So, she’d turned to her newest love: charts. She’d discovered this hobby during their road trip after realizing she enjoyed the hours spent mapping their route and the various systems they passed through. Darla has a wealth of charts in her own database but most are painfully out of date; over the last few years Adora has updated or replaced about a quarter of them. Their current course is her latest puzzle. It’s an area of space they have never been: the Photanous System. Darla had laid out a course based on her database, but given her track record and the scarcity of available information on the area, they all agreed to manually fly through it. Thankfully, it’s only the last six hours of their journey.

Yet even the charts had lost their charm today. After a moment of pondering her remaining options for entertainment, she decides the only logical course of action is to bother Catra. So, Adora makes her way to the bridge, glancing out the window as she passes by to find almost nothing in view. This part of space is quite empty. In fact, most of space is empty; she hadn’t really grasped the fact until their road trip. With hundreds of systems and often astronomical distances between them, it would take a lifetime to tackle the areas of space interplanetary infrastructure would allow them to reach, let alone the universe. 

Catra is sitting curled up in the pilot's chair, staring out at the patchwork of stars off in the distance, and in a rare slip of situational awareness, she doesn’t notice Adora approaching. Eager to take advantage of this, Adora tiptoes up the the chair and lays her arms on the back of it, her chin resting on her forearm as she peers down on a mess of hair that had been hastily thrown into a ponytail (really, there was more hair outside it than in, what was the point?)

“Hey, Catra,” she says in her best imitation of her girlfriend’s signature greeting. 

Catra jumps with a squeak, and looks up to scowl at her. Adora snickers, reaching her hand down to ruffle the top of her hair, which earns her a small squeal as Catra ducks away, scrunching herself up into a ball with her knees tucked inside her gaudy, dark yellow sweater. It has a crude picture of Melog knitted on the front, similar in style to Adora’s Swift Wind one. Despite being teased relentlessly by Glimmer, Catra had gone misty eyed over Casta’s gift, and had taken meticulous care of the garment. She can get away with fitting her entire body inside of it because it fits her more like a nightgown than a sweater. 

“Ugh, it’s you,” Catra huffs. 

“Make room.”

Adora doesn’t give her the chance to actually comply, and sprawls across her knees. The position is more precarious than she’d anticipated, and after a moment she rolls forward into Catra’s face, who grunts irritably, dropping her knees away and depositing the blond space invader into her lap. Adora stretches out with a sigh, her arms and legs dangling over the arms of the chair and Catra rolls her eyes.

“Wow,” she snorts. “Nice entrance. Isn’t that supposed to be my job? Because you’re terrible at it.”

“Worked out though,” Adora mumbles with a grin.

“You are asking for trouble.”

“If you tickle me, I’ll knee you in the face.”

“I swear I will bite you, Adora.”

 _“Oh-ho!”_ Adora crows, waggling her eyebrows with glee. “Will you now?”

Catra’s eyes narrow to slits. “I could dump your dumb ass on the floor, you know that, right?”

“Nah, you like me too much.”

“I do not like you.”

“Yes you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Yes you do,” Adora says, her grin widening. “You think I’m gorgeous.”

“No.”

“Yeah you do. You think I’m gorgeous, you want to kiss me, and love me, and —”

Adora’s words are cut short as Catra cups her face with such force her cheeks scrunch together and her lips pucker. If looks could kill, Adora would have been incinerated on the spot. This does not concern her in the least. 

“You are so —”

“Stunning?” Adora says through fish lips.

“Full of yourself.”

Struggling to speak freely due to the state of her cheeks, Adora expresses herself by making odd kissing noises, driving home the fish impression (wait, do fish make kissing noises?) This proves to be too much for Catra, who laughs through her death glare. Adora starts snorting immediately as her face is released, and they both take a moment to compose themselves. Antics over, Adora feels her eyes starting to droop. She adjusts her position, shifting herself more upright to lean her head between Catra’s shoulder and the back of the chair. It isn’t as comfortable as a bed, but the company is much better. 

After a minute or so of comfortable silence, Adora glances over at Catra, who appears lost in thought.

“You okay?” She asks softly. 

Catra’s blue eye flicks towards her, then back outside again.

“Yeah,” she murmurs. Adora raises her eyebrows, and Catra adds. “Just thinking, I guess.”

“About the mission?”

Catra scoffs quietly. “What else could I be thinking about? Have you been thinking about anything else?”

Adora shrugs. “Mostly how bored I was sitting most of the day.”

Catra chuckles, but doesn’t look entirely convinced. Adora continues, her tone a bit more serious.

“Yeah, I’ve been worrying. I just hope I can destroy the signal’s source. I don’t want it to hurt anyone, or…” she trails off. 

A brief silence follows this as their conversation from a few nights ago replays in her head. Adora doesn’t want to lose She-Ra. She could live without her, sure. But She-Ra had done so much good, why would she want that to go away? Catra frowns at her for a moment, and the corner of her lip twitches. It looks like she might comment on the unspoken words, but for some reason she decides to let it go. 

“We have Bow, and we can video call Entrapta if we need to,” Catra says curtly, and Adora nods slowly in response. Perhaps she doesn’t need to worry about it. It is promising, yet as Adora replays the words she heard in her visions, she shakes her head.

“I don’t know, it feels…” she trails off, and Catra shifts to look at her properly, more alert now. “The messages I received were just…odd. I wish I knew what they meant.”

Catra frowns, but then shrugs it off. “If it’s a thousand year old signal like Entrapta thinks it is, you can’t expect it to make much sense.”

“Yeah I suppose so.”

“You think there’s more?”

“I’m not sure. I just…wonder if there might be something connected to my past. Where I came from. I don’t really need to know I guess but…”

“It would be nice,” Catra adds, then smiles a little. “I get it. I’ve wondered a lot myself.”

Adora frowns. “You wonder about where I came from?”

Catra rolls her eyes. “No, where I came from.”

“Oh, sorry, _duh._ ”

“Nah, it’s okay. You deserve to have selfish moments here and there.”

Adora chuckles, but then falls silent as she considers the idea. For some reason, it’s a subject they hardly bring up, but then, they haven’t had a need to have they? It was never about where they came from. Yet even so, Adora at least knew that she was pulled through a portal by Light Hope. Catra knows nothing beyond her arrival to the Fright Zone in an empty fruit crate. Any memories of her old life were wiped away by Shadow Weaver.

“Now you’re wondering about it,” Catra says, grinning.

“Well, I’m curious.”

“Yeah, well, I try not to put too much thought into it. Not like I’ll ever know.”

Adora sighs, dissatisfied, but unsure of how she could dispute it, and too tired to put more thought into it.

“Maybe we will someday,” she yawns.

Catra chuckles, and Adora is suddenly more aware of the motion of her laughter. It’s nice. Curling up even more, she scoots herself down so that she can rest her head on Catra’s shoulder. 

“You sleeping here?” Catra asks softly.

“Can I?”

“Of course you can, Dummy.”

Adora mumbles an incoherent thanks, letting her eyes drift closed. She’s out in a matter of minutes.

…

The room shudders violently. Red light fills every corner, accompanied by a blaring siren. Large windows open up to a distorted view of space beyond. Inside the ship, control panels and monitors are all flashing in warning, but that does not stop the flurry of activity from the occupants at the control console. 

Adora looks around, trying to make sense of the space she is in, and attempts to make eye contact with anyone. Nobody seems to notice her.

“What’s going on?” She shouts, but her voice feels sluggish, like she’s dragging it out of her lungs, and it holds little volume.

“General! Another squadron of Prime ships incoming,” a woman with coppery skin and dark hair says, fingers flying across a screen as she pulls information from the ship. “Weapons systems are down!”

A blond man rushes to stand behind her, pale blue eyes alight with a desperate, frightening energy.

“Where is she?” He hisses. “Where is the traitor?”

“I don’t know Sir,” the woman replies, grunting as something hits their ship and throws her forward into the console. “But the Portal is open and it won’t stay that way for long, it’s already unstable.”

The General hesitates, and then curses softly. “Give us the maximum jump and send us through; take all squadrons, full power to rear shields, and we will disintegrate whatever Prime ships follow us. Is the exit point stable?”

“For now, but it’s not Despondos. It might not even be a new location.”

Another voice interrupts their conversation as another officer rushes over.

“But…the Heart of Etheria!” He shouts. “We just let her take it?”

“The Heart of Etheria is lost, but it doesn’t matter,” the General says; his tone is remarkably cool, yet the gleam of manic energy remains. “Our human assets are more important; we can regroup wherever it takes us and rebuild the project without the fatal flaw of needing a goddess to make it work.” He shoots a pointed look in the woman’s direction.

Adora turns to her, eyes searching, and opens her mouth to say something but draws a blank. 

The woman does not respond to this, instead focusing on the looming hole in space-time. “Get ready! Portal transport in three...two...one…”

The windows go black, and the shuddering rises in intensity, becoming so violent that Adora fears her teeth might fall out. Then, almost as suddenly as it began, it ends. The darkness vanishes, and they’re flying through a massive debris field. The planet they are next to is not Etheria, but a dusty rust and gray planet surrounded by Horde ships adrift, some fragmented, others intact. A ringing silence greets this.

“Commander Artana,” the General says quietly to the woman at the controls. “Where are we?”

“Adjacent to...Magnezia, Sir.”

“Interesting. Are you able to get any readings from those ships?”

“No General, they…” she blinks. “They are much too advanced -- beyond anything we have encountered before.”

“Is anyone on board?”

“No, not that I can tell. They haven’t even reacted to us.”

“Can we get confirmation that we have traveled in time?” 

“Yes,” Artana says. “The ship’s computer is…struggling. There doesn’t appear to be datetime information for it to pick up.”

“No common signal?”

“No…wait, I have it.”

Numbers flicker on the screen in front of them, but instead of a date, Adora sees what look like coordinates, and her heart pounds even harder. The blond man smiles.

“One thousand years...” he says softly. “Why so far?”

Evidently, Adora is the only one who doesn’t see a date, but there’s no time to figure out why. She listens intently.

“It’s the maximum allowed time jump, Sir,” Artana says. “It requires the highest power setting.”

“Indeed.” He turns to her. “And it was the only way we were going to make it through in one piece. Well, this suits us; it appears Prime has met his match. Commanders, take us in towards the nearest ship. Let us see what treasures have been left behind for us to harvest.”

He turns slowly until his gaze locks on Adora, who stiffens. He smiles, a soft, almost pleasant expression.

“For the glory of the new Eternian Empire.”

Adora is rooted to her vantage point, unaware that she’s holding her breath, or of the sweat beading on her forehead, or of the voice shouting her name. She watches as the room begins to cheer, and as half a dozen more ships come into view.

The room lurches violently, pain explodes in her head, and Adora wakes with a scream.

****

~~~~

****

“Adora!”

Catra shakes her shoulders again but Adora doesn’t respond, knees tight to her chest, arms wrapped around her head, twitching and shaking. Catra is so frustrated she wants to scream, but she can’t manage anything beyond a hoarse whisper. 

Two hours of her shift had gone by without a peep. Catra was impressed Adora had stayed out that long, but she certainly hadn’t minded. Then, out of nowhere she’d gone completely rigid. At first, Catra tried to wake her gently, assuming she was having a tense dream; Adora was still known for her violent sleeping habits. Then, she’d screamed like nothing Catra had ever heard, struck out at her, and fallen off the chair.

Now, she’s staring out at nothing, and the only reason Catra believes she’s conscious is because she’s blinking every so often.

“ _What_ is going on?”

Catra whips around to see Glimmer teleporting behind the pilot’s chair. It takes a moment for the scene to sink in, but when it does, she gasps.

“Help me!” Catra growls. “Snap her out of this!”

Glimmer draws runes in the air, but none of the spells seem to have an impact. She curses with frustration when suddenly, Adora sits bolt upright, sending Catra reeling backwards, her shoulder still smarting from where Adora had hit her a few minutes before. Catra freezes, holding her breath as Adora levels each of them with a wide eyed stare. She blinks a few times, opens and closes her mouth, and the expression goes from bewildered to horrified. Catra’s heart drops right down to her knees, her throat constricting.

“What happened?” Bow shouts as he races into the room, panting. 

“I thought you said the ship would shield her!” Catra snarls, and Bow recoils slightly. If she weren’t so upset she might feel bad for her tone, but she doesn’t. Not yet anyway.

“Wha…?” Bow jumps to the control panels and starts pulling up data. His eyes widen.

“What is it?” Glimmer asks fearfully.

“It didn’t work because it was way more powerful than Entrapta anticipated,” Bow says. He looks down at Adora who closes her eyes for a moment, dropping her head down and then jolting back upright again with a grimace. Catra’s anger dissipates and she scoots closer to Adora.

“Adora?” She says uncertainly. “Are you okay?”

“No,” Adora replies hoarsely, and looks up at her. “It’s them. The First Ones. Eternians. They’re here.”

“What do you mean by that?” Bow asks, quiet as he sits down with the rest of them.

“The First Ones are here. I saw…I saw them. They made a portal and they’re here to finish what they started.” She gulps, and Catra reaches for her hand automatically, but Adora barely seems to notice. “They’re rebuilding the Heart of Etheria, and they’re going to use it to build an empire.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We see a lot of Catra being "a cat" in the show but we don't see the "people interacting with cats" side of things. Aka, I regularly greet my cat by smothering her, and like, really are you living if you aren't constantly invading your cat's space? (Note: my cat has a LOT of patience lmao).
> 
> Anyway, thank you to my lovely commenters <3, and for all the kudos, you all give me life! Also, NaNoWriMo is officially in full swing, and as I mentioned in earlier chapters I will be working on this fic for it. I'm guessing I'll be on a bi-weekly posting schedule...not sure though. But, chapter 7 is mostly done-ish? So I SHOULD get it up sometime in November. 
> 
> Cheers everyone!


	7. Toss The Cat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Throw the cat. Swing that feline like a baseball bat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hellooooooo everyone! Here be another chapter. I'm actually impressed I was mostly able to stick to this timeline with NaNoWriMo going on. However, my brain is turning to liquid as we speak, hopefully this doesn't bode ill for my formatting...but! I'll have to find that out later. Enjoy!

_“Easing power to thirty percent. Stage two complete. Set to idle for one minute, increase to full for thirty.”_

The shield test chatter plays in Artana’s ear, signaling the start of her countdown. Full power means three minutes allotted for shutdown before anyone can leave the shield sphere -- three whole minutes where twenty high level personnel are stuck in a room. She’s made this walk countless times in the last year or so and marches through the corridors like she owns the place. It would take close proximity to see the sweat just starting to bead at the base of her neck. Her final message has been sent, and now all that is left to do is destroy the evidence.

She stops at the General’s office, glancing at her watch. As she does, the comm link lights up again. 

_“Ten, nine, eight…”_

Artana hovers just out of sight of the door’s camera with her finger poised on the ear-bud, ready to switch channels to contact Gerhard. Her breathing quickens. 

_“...two, one, engaged. Holding maximum power.”_

Artana hits the button. “Now.”

There’s a gentle click as the door opens in time to the distant shield generators rumbling to full power, shaking the ground beneath her feet like a distant behemoth in the desert. Her plan is in motion, and there’s no turning back. The result is anti-climactic for such a devastating action; the virus is a silent, pervasive beast, deleting large sections of code critical for safely controlling the power distribution of the base, including the cannon, transmitter, and the shields. If it works the way she wants, it’ll initiate a safety lockdown that will have to be manually disabled, one station at a time while the code is rebuilt, and Artana has hit over a dozen of them. It could take days, maybe weeks to find and fix every piece. 

“Who’s —”

Quill’s inquiry is cut off as Artana surges into the room, kneeing him in the gut and putting him down with relative ease, which wouldn’t have been the case had she given him another second to think. Stripping him of his weapons, she turns to the table holding the magicat prisoner the General had been torturing yesterday. Her brow furrows with worry as she leans over him. He grins.

“Oh hello,” he purrs, and she recoils, rolling her eyes. “Thought you’d never show up, General.”

“Khaz. And here I was thinking you’d be deadweight.”

“Well, I would have been in about an hour,” he says conversationally. His voice is deep and raspy, and he opens his eyes to peer at his visitor. Despite the evident weariness, his expression is one of good humor. “You know what your superiors meant by ‘release it’ right?”

“And here I was getting my hopes up,” she says dryly.

“I mean at the rate you’re going I might be.”

“Patience is a virtue.”

She pauses as the distant whirl of the shield generators begins to slow -- the second countdown begins. Three minutes before General Grayskull can act. Pulling out a dagger, she pries open the control panel on the side of the table and eyes it for a moment. Once the right traces are found, she presses the blade against them and a beep is heard as they short together. The bindings release. 

“I could kiss you.”

Mm, you’re not really my taste, and not with that beard anyway. Can you walk?”

“Of course I can. Is the beard really that awful for kissing?”

“How would I know?”

“Well now I’m feeling self-conscious.”

“My ‘taste’ is women, Khaz. You know that,” Artana sighs, offering him a hand which he ignores. “Don’t be such an old cretin.” 

“My dear General, we are the same age,” Khaz chuckles, rolling off the table and getting gingerly to his feet. He sways, takes a step, and promptly attempts to face-plant. Artana rushes forward, catching him and cursing under her breath. He lets out a puff of air, blinking rapidly. “Ah. _Saz._ ”

“You think?”

“It’s fine, I’ve got this. Just give me a minute.”

“We don’t have a minute.”

He straightens up again, batting away Artana’s hand and takes a careful step. He staggers, but doesn’t fall and then grins at her, giving a thumbs up.

“Fine then. Good to go, come on General. Give me that gun.”

She hands him the rifle, but does not look convinced. However, their options are limited, so she peers around the door and leads him along. When he doesn’t keep up, she takes his free arm and slings it around her shoulder before they take off in an awkward lope. 

“So what’s the plan?” Khaz wheezes.

“Well, I just locked a bunch of my superiors in a giant cage and ruined half their computers,” Artana replies, taking a sharp left, and Khaz grunts as he nearly falls. “I was under the impression you were responsible for our exit plan.”

“Oh, so _I_ have to do all the work. I see.”

“This would have been much easier if you hadn’t been captured.”

“It’s not my fault I’m a magicat.”

“I gave you a disguise you useless —”

Artana cuts herself short as they round the corner straight into a patrol. Both parties freeze, and it’s a bit of a sight; a decorated former general hauling a seemingly elderly and handicapped magicat with a laser rifle. Khaz grins, then raises the weapon which slides out of his hand and clatters to the floor, shaking the guards out of their stupor.

“Hey!”

“Launch!” Artana shouts, and with a sudden burst of energy she ducks down, seizes Khaz’s other arm and throws him over her head at the guards as they scramble for their own weapons.

Khaz picks up on the idea and pushes off with his feet as she throws him, and his rather significant weight bowls two of the three over straight away. The third has to jump out of the way and raises his weapon.

“Stand down!” Artana bellows. Years of training and following orders from this woman stops him in his tracks, giving her the split second she needs to dive for his feet, knocking him to the ground. He cries out, but the sound is cut short as a white furred foot kicks him in the head. 

“I’m usually much better at this,” Khaz grunts, rolling off the other two — now unconscious — guards. 

“Well, you’re good for something at least,” Artana says as she helps him back to his feet with a grunt. “I’m too old for this.”

“Hey, between the two of us, which one was tortured for two days?”

“Like I was saying,” Artana grunts as they move along again. “If you had used the disguise I gave you, you wouldn’t have been captured.”

“Let’s not dwell on the past, Artana, it’s an ugly place.”

As they move through the halls at a four legged lope, Khaz slowly begins to regain his faculties, and the pair moves more quickly as Artana’s burden is relieved.

“If you are wondering though,” Khaz pants, “The ship is hiding behind the moon. Transmit at thirty megahertz and they’ll get it and come.”

“Can they land?”

“I wouldn’t advise it.”

“That’s fine, we can take my ship.”

“So you _do_ have a ship.”

“It’s just a light fighter, don’t get excited.”

He merely grunts, removing his arm from around Artana’s shoulder and running on his own. There’s a slight limp to his gait and he stumbles frequently, but the pair is making good time now.

“What sort of welcoming party can we expect in the hangar?”

“Oh, just a few security drones, maybe some low-level personnel.”

“How did you manage that?”

“Everyone is distracted by the shield test. Don’t worry, they’ll figure it out soon enough. We have one minute until all their communication systems are back online. My ship is two cells past the skiff mooring. If we run for it, we might make it unobstructed.”

“And how are we going to get so lucky, General?”

“Oh, we won’t I’m sure.”

The pair dive into another hallway to avoid two more patrols, and by the time they reach the entrance to the hangar, Artana receives the dreaded confirmation from Gerhard: the shields are down, and half the base will be converging upon them. Almost on cue, they are bathed in a soothing blue light, which pulses ominously as it shifts to purple, then red, and back to blue again. Khaz is transfixed momentarily and Artana elbows him.

“That’s the alarm. Try not to get hypnotized. Are you ready?”

“Is anyone ever really?” He says thoughtfully.

Artana seizes the hangar door and pulls it, ducking away as they are met with immediate laser fire. Khaz swears furiously, snapping out of his stupor and grabbing her around the middle, his back toward the fire as he pushes her through the door and down the ramp, ducking low. 

“What are you doing?” Artana shouts as they dive for cover behind a skiff. 

“Getting us thirty feet farther than we were a few seconds ago,” Khaz grunts. There’s a burned, oozing hole in the back of his shoulder that definitely wasn’t there before. 

Artana peers around the edge of the skiff to see four soldiers with rifles raised. She curses quietly and sits back down, grabbing a small orb from her belt. 

“If I have to use this I’m leaving you behind,” she hisses. Khaz snorts. 

“Then we’d better hurry before I remember I’ve been shot.”

The two of them make a run for it, Khaz with his own weapon blazing as they run from one skiff to the next and encounter their first bit of luck: their quarry has been moving counterclockwise, the same direction as they are. This means their assailants are near the doorway and do not have a clear shot through the parked skiffs. 

“Funny, for being part of a conquering empire their battle tactics are shit,” Khaz grunts. 

“Well two third of the main army was lost in the Battle of Magnezia, the rest were mostly trainees,” Artana whispers as they make it to the edge of the last skiff before the docking cells. “Besides, if they spread out it becomes target practice for me, and they know that.”

Stowing the orb away now that they have some distance between them and their attackers, she raises her gun to the soldiers weaving through the skiffs and fires. The laser strike glances off the edge of an armored shoulder but makes them pause. Artana grins despite the situation and continues to run. 

“Okay, but you missed.”

“Not the point!”

“I keep hearing rumors about your legendary marksmanship…” Khaz pants, pausing to take a breath, “but I have yet to see a display...that elevates them...to anything else.”

Artana tuts impatiently as they stop at a cell holding an elegant silver ship. Smooth edges align to a pointed nose, the body elongated for cutting through an atmosphere at record speed. 

As she remotely starts the engine, a low, angry buzzing sound meets their ears and Artana’s face pales slightly. However, her companion hears it as well and leaps with surprising agility into the co-pilot’s seat. Artana slips in after him, and rushes to activate the shields. Just as they fire up, three needle-like projectiles bury themselves in the viewscreen, held at bay only by the shields, and even then a thin crack forms in the outer layer of glass. 

“Hold on!” Artana shouts, and throttles the engine. 

The ship jumps forward, wings unfolding as it elevates and turns, before sprinting for the main hangar door. The eerie glow of the alarm, stark as it was indoors, is less potent in the open hangar, but the daylight from outside is suddenly dimmed as the massive blast doors begin to close in an attempt to cut off their escape. 

Luckily for the escapees, the action comes too late. The ship slips through the narrowing gap and out into the desert light beyond. 

“What,” Khaz grunts through gritted teeth. “Was that?”

“That is why the patrols are so small,” Artana says. “Security drones.”

“I know they were security drones, but why did they look like —”

Their ship lurches violently as they take ground fire and Artana points the ship at the sand, diving down till they’re so close they might as well be a skiff. The ship’s speed kicks up a massive dust cloud behind them as they go, allowing them a bit more cover. 

They sit in silence for a moment, then the comm system beeps. Artana flips a switch. 

_“You would do this to your own.”_

It is not a question. 

“Don’t answer,” Khaz grunts. 

Artana presses the button to talk. “I do this _for_ them.”

_“You are forcing my hand, Artana. I take no joy in what comes next. Your conspirators will face judgment.”_

“I am saving our culture,” Artana says. “You would turn us into our worst enemy.”

_“You are misguided. I will find you.”_

“Yes,” Artana breathes, teeth gritted. “I daresay you will.”

She switches the channel off, sending a jamming frequency in its place and transfers to another. She looks over her shoulder again to see her companion staring at her, his expression impressed.

“How serious is he about that threat?”

“More than he even thinks. How’s your shoulder?”

“Oh, oozing I’m sure. I think it was a glancing blow.”

“Here,” Artana levels the ship a few hundred feet off the ground, and switches on the autopilot before twisting around in her seat, reaching up into an overhanging compartment and pulling out a pouch. From within, she extracts a little rubberized syringe filled with a gray paste. “Let me see, this will cauterize it and fight infection.”

“Mmm…sounds painful.”

“Oh, it’s excruciating.”

Khaz ‘s expression turns grim, closing his eyes as he braces himself. Without further warning, Artana jabs the syringe into the wound and injects the paste. It’s quick, but her companion stiffens, a snarl ripping from his throat and he lurches back as soon as she’s done. She tosses the syringe aside, brushing her hands off on her uniform and retakes the controls.

“Can’t have you oozing on my upholstery,” she says blithely. “I have standards you know.”

Khaz doesn’t move except to grin, before saying weakly, “I expect nothing less.”

Artana takes them up near vertically, and in a few minutes they’re clear of Magnezia’s atmosphere. Activating the cloaking signal and punching in the desired frequency, she sets them on course to intercept the waiting ship and turns to face her companion once more, who’s now sitting still with his eyes closed. Her expression softens.

“Hey,” she says quietly.

He cracks an eye open, and Artana smiles.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t worry,” he replies. “I have no intention of sacrificing myself for you. I’m not that noble.”

They both laugh, and return their attention to the mission, making their way towards the small, plain moon on the other side of which resides their salvation and their ticket to the next phase of their plan: finding She-Ra.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that is officially the end of Part 1. At least, it is in my head. Act 1? Whatever. Thank you all for the read, and once again thanks to everyone who's been commenting, last chapter I was spoiled rotten, I love hearing your thoughts :). Also, the squad will return in the next chapter, which will be LONG and hopefully I can get it up this month but no promises. However, I do have like 25k of new content written in the last two weeks so there is much to come!
> 
> [Feel free to drop by and say hello](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/) as always, and this time we have a song! I could picture a lot of this scene to the following song, or at least the latter half of the chapter XD. [yes i love pirates of the caribbean](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dv6pJ2D_Sek)


	8. Boom, Bitch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Boom boom, kids.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Welcome back, this one took a while but also I was finishing up NaNo. In exchange for the wait though, here's almost 6k for you! I would recommend taking a peek at the end of Chapter 6, because this picks up right where it left off. 
> 
> Honestly, this chapter was super fun to write, so I hope you all have fun reading it!
> 
> As always, a huge thank you to my wonderful editor, Jessica, and to all of you readers who give me life ❤️

“What do you mean, Empire? Adora, what did you see?” Catra asks desperately.

“They…” Adora groans, unable to complete the thought. The color drains from her face, eyes glaze with pain, and a cold pit opens in Catra’s stomach.

“Adora? What do you need? _Glimmer!_ ” 

“I’m trying!” Glimmer says frantically, her eyes rather bright as she desperately tries spell after spell, but nothing works.

“I need to lie down,” Adora says breathlessly.

“Here,” Catra says, scooting back so Adora can rest her head in her lap.

“I don’t know how to block it,” Bow says angrily, “it’s been amplified way beyond anything we’ve seen before!”

Catra says nothing in response as Adora rests an arm over her eyes, trying to take deep, steady breaths, but she’s trembling. She pulls her knees towards her chest, muscles visibly tensed and her breathing hitches, then stops. Catra leans forward slightly and begins alternating between stroking Adora’s hair, and tracing her fingers along the back of her neck.

“Breathe,” she murmurs. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

At first there’s no response, then Adora relaxes a bit and breathes again. Catra continues the light massage, and finds it calms herself a little as well. Glimmer abandons her spells, jumping to the ships database to search for anything helpful. The seconds drag by in agonizing silence, until finally Adora relaxes slightly and releases a shaky sigh. Is it relief? Catra stills, holding her breath in anticipation.

“Don’t stop,” Adora murmurs. Catra complies and exhales, but she finds little relief. 

“It’s…gone,” Bow says, sounding stunned.

“Gone?” Glimmer asks. 

“Completely,” Bow replies. A second later, the console beeps with an incoming call. He answers, and an exuberant voice fills the bridge.

_“BOW! Whoever sent this signal wasn’t just—”_

Adora flinches, and Catra shoots Bow a death glare; not like it’s his fault, but he’s the closest one to Entrapta, so he’ll have to do.

 _“Entrapta!”_ He hisses. “Adora is…”

 _“Oh…sorry,”_ she whispers back, and Catra is pleasantly surprised by how quickly she understands the situation. _“I’m guessing she’s compromised. I’m not surprised, but the signal is gone now.”_

“What do you mean, _compromised?_ ” Catra yells.

 _“I don’t know for sure because I can’t analyze her, but her brain likely sustained damage,”_ Entrapta says hurriedly. She seems to realize the bomb she dropped a moment later because just as the room starts to spin, she adds, _“I don’t think it’s permanent, though. This signal was a whopper! That much power at an audible frequency would have killed her and ripped the ship apart like a lithium dihydrogen monoxide reaction! She’s lucky to get away with a headache. But, whoever sent the signal wasn’t just aiming for She-Ra, they rerouted it through Etheria as well. Somebody’s trying to send us a sign!”_

“What do you mean?” Bow asks, and despite wishing she could tune him out, Catra can’t stop listening.

_“The ghost signal we saw in the lab? It wasn’t a ghost! It’s rerouted, the same signal but coming from somewhere else. I’d need Darla to analyze it adequately, but I’m doing what I can here. I’ll call you back with more updates.”_

“What should we do for Adora in the meantime?” Bow says anxiously. “Darla’s shields didn’t protect her, what if it happens again? I knew I should have brought the helmet!”

 _“Darla’s shields did protect her,”_ Entrapta sounds borderline offended. _“She would be worse off without them. As for if it happens again, she should stay on the ship. Up till this afternoon I was able to monitor the signal continuously, even when it wasn’t transmitting, but now there’s no trace! It’s fascinating! In any case, your best bet is to find the source and destroy it. And bring back samples!”_

“What? No! We need to go back!” Bow yelps, then flinches at Catra’s wicked gaze, though Adora doesn’t react to the noise this time.

_“But, I’ve already analyzed the coordinates Adora received, and they don’t match the location of the signal source. Whoever sent this wants you to go somewhere else.”_

“Which means we _need_ to go to the source,” Glimmer says, looking up from the ship’s directory.

_“Exactly! There was another set of coordinates buried in the data as well. I’m analyzing those alongside the rerouted signal to see if they match. Emily! I need that ultra-mixer board, no…the other one, I need — I need to call you later. Bye!”_

The line goes dead, and Glimmer scoots over to Adora again.

“This spell should work,” she says, “but it’ll put you to sleep. Is that okay?”

A muffled grunt is all she gets from Adora, and while Catra hates the idea of using magic, she hates Adora’s suffering more. She nods at Glimmer, who reaches forward and places her hand on Adora’s forehead. Then, she draws a complex rune in the air with her other hand. It shimmers purple and white for a moment before vanishing. Adora shifts, dropping her arm away from her eyes and relaxing completely. It isn’t long before she’s sound asleep, and only then does Catra’s heart begin to slow itself, if only a little.

“Healing spell,” Glimmer sighs, “I was so busy trying to get rid of the signal, I didn’t realize it was more about damage control.”

“I’ll take her to bed,” Catra says.

“Hold on,” Bow interjects, “are we decided then?”

“On staying our course? “Catra asks. “I don’t see how we have any other choice. If we go back, there’s nothing to stop the Eternians from blasting that signal again.”

She hates the idea of going so close to the source, especially given what Adora had just said. Her gaze drifts down to her lap again, and Adora is already snoring softly. A smile creeps onto Catra’s face despite herself, and she reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind Adora’s ear. She stirs slightly, but remains deep in sleep. 

“When we get there, she’s not allowed anywhere near it,” Catra says firmly. “If either of you let her outside, I will personally eject you into space.”

“Calm down,” Glimmer says, rolling her eyes. We’re on the same page.”

“Darla will provide some protection,” Bow adds with a nod.

“We’ll lock her in cold storage if we have to,” Glimmer says, and Catra grins at her.

“We’ll…try other options first,” Bow says decisively. “But yes.”

“Good,“ Catra nods, and then with some effort (certainly more effort than Adora has lifting her) gathers Adora in her arms and gets to her feet. 

“You want me to teleport…?”

“No, I’ve got her.”

Catra doesn’t know why she submits herself to this. Adora seems to get heavier the farther she walks, and Catra shuffles the last few feet before quickly setting her on the bed.

“Jeez, Adora, I didn’t realize you were made of lead,” she chides, and chuckles to herself. 

Adora rolls over, clutching the covers and pulling them over herself. As she does this, her mouth falls open and Catra is certain there will be a puddle of drool on the pillow when she wakes. Sitting down on the other side of the bed, she watches her for a moment, smiling as her gentle snores fill the room. Her heart is still pounding fiercely, and she reaches out, laying a hand on Adora’s cheek; she’s warm, not feverish, and the color has returned. Catra shakes her head, letting her hand fall away.

“You’re going to be the death of me,” she grumbles, and crawls into the bed next to her, allowing her mind to wander to the other terrible thing that has, until now, been waiting patiently to plague her.

What the hell are they supposed to do about Eternians? Their technology and ancient scuffles have given the four of them more than a few headaches in their lives. When had the Eternians shown up? Was it before Prime was defeated? It seems unlikely, because while she doesn’t know much about technology, she knows using a portal is like lighting a torch in a closet; anything with half-decent tech is going to pick up on it. If the Eternians had used a portal while Prime was still around, he would have shown up and wiped them out in a heartbeat. She’s honestly surprised that Entrapta didn’t pick it up. Then again, she had no reason to be looking.

Moving on from the “how” to the “why,” Catra finds herself in a deeper hole still. The possible explanations (all bad) and motivations (even worse) the Eternians could have for trying to build an Empire and rebuild a super-weapon roll through her mind on a loop. Groaning out loud, she shifts so her back is pressed against Adora’s and closes her eyes. 

_We’ll find a way to stop them,_ she can already hear Adora saying.

“Yeah,” she murmurs to herself. “But at what cost?”

****

~~~~

****

**  
**

Adora wakes up alone. She doesn’t remember being moved to bed. Not to mention, this isn’t her bed…where is she? What’s going on?

She sits up too quickly and yelps in pain, squinting a moment and rubbing her temple furiously until it subsides. Once it does, she looks around. Everything comes back to her in a rush; her dream, the unbelievable pain, the Eternians, Catra stroking her hair, Glimmer saying something about a healing spell…

“Hi there sleepyhead.”

Adora looks around to see Glimmer standing in the doorway with her arms crossed, smiling at her. Adora blinks a few times and rubs the sleep out of her eyes.

“How long have I been out?”

“Fourteen hours.”

Adora blanches. _“What?”_

“You needed it.”

“I’m so sorry, my shift, navigation, I…”

“You _needed_ it.”

The conviction in Glimmer’s voice stops Adora’s twittering in her tracks. Partially because she’s scary, but also because she’s right: Adora’s body aches, and her head still has a threatening aura to it, like it might flair up later, but she does feel much better. She swings her feet off the bed and tests her weight gingerly before standing up. The room isn’t spinning, and the pain seems to be dissipating with movement; she lets out a sigh of relief.

“Better?” Glimmer asks, a hint of anxiety in her tone. Adora smiles.

“Much. Thanks.”

“You had us worried.”

“I know, I’m…” she pauses. “I’m feeling better now though.”

Glimmer nods, and anticipating her next question, says, “Catra is flying. We’re almost to the signal’s source.”

“Okay,” Adora stretches. “Any sign of Eternian ships?”

“Not yet, whatever it is isn’t coming from a ship. Bow thinks it might be a transceiver station.”

“A what?”

“It transmits and receives signals. I don’t know, ask him if you want more details. But, most importantly there doesn’t seem to be anyone around.”

“Good,” Adora says. “I’ll be right out. Tell Catra I’m up.”

Glimmer nods again, and vanishes. It takes a few minutes for Adora to get her wits about her. She feels a bit like she had the other night after her brutal training session, except most of the discomfort is in her head. But more important than physical discomfort is the knowledge of what she’d seen.

She knew there was more, she’d even told Catra before her ill-fated nap. Yet there was so much that didn’t make sense:How had they managed the portal after Mara took away the Heart of Etheria? Wasn’t it the only power source strong enough to create one? And why were they after her if they were trying to make it work without “a goddess?”

The last tidbit of information perplexes Adora even more. She-Ra is powerful, but Adora has never considered her powers godly. At least…it never felt that way. Beyond knowing there was once a line of She-Ra’s, she knew nothing else about her true origin. Who was She-Ra, really? It’s a question she’s never allowed herself to ask. because she assumed the answer was lost. Maybe it isn’t.

Shaking herself back to the present, Adora changes into something more mission appropriate (her usual red jacket and black pants), and makes her way out to the bridge.

Catra is in the pilot’s chair managing manual controls on each arm; Entrapta had installed the mechanical controls a few months into their road trip on a visit home after Catra expressed her preference, and since she was the best pilot nobody argued with her decision. Standing beside her and scanning the blackness beyond for danger is Glimmer, while Bow is at the control console manning the instruments and scanners.

“Hey, Adora,” Catra says without looking. “Thought you were going to sleep through the whole mission.”

“Somebody’s got t-t-to…” Adora’s sentence is lost to a yawn for a moment before she continues. “…keep things running.”

Catra spares her a brief smirk, giving her a once over before turning to look where she’s going again. 

“Adora! How are you feeling?” Bow asks anxiously.

“Great,” Adora says, waving him off. “Much better.”

“Good, we’re almost here,” Bow says. “I’m picking up something on the scanner just beyond the station…looks…” Bow gulps. “Looks like an asteroid field.”

“Oh relax,” Catra says lazily. “We don’t have to go through it.”

“Past experience says otherwise,” Adora says.

“Yeah, and Bow had to drive,” Glimmer chortles. “If it weren’t so terrifying it would have been fun.”

“I try not to think about it,” Bow groans.

“I think I can see it,” Catra says suddenly. 

“Computer says we’re ten minutes away,” Bow turns to the console again.

Adora walks up to the windows and squints. For a moment, all she sees is empty space, but then she picks out a large speck, just barely reflecting some of the light from the distant star it orbits. It looks like a jagged piece of scrap metal, but as they get closer she can see it more clearly. 

“I would love to see Entrapta’s face right now,” Catra says distractedly as she stares at the incredible feat of technology in front of them.

The main bulk of the station is a torus, with seemingly nothing connecting it to the inner shell, which looks a bit like Catra’s hair does in the morning after a night of drinking: pieces of metal sticking out at odd angles and varying lengths. Yet the closer they get, the more Adora can see, and it isn’t long before she realizes that it is not as random as it appears; each jagged spike is metal folded carefully on itself, and each spire is at a different angle. Bow gasps in awe.

“I was right,” he says. “It’s a huge transceiver station! Look at all of those antennas, it must transmit thousands of frequencies, and the torus must power…no, you can see a core in the middle of the antennas, that must be the power source, so that’s not it…”

“Can you scan it? How do we disable it?” Glimmer asks.

“I’m guessing the torus is a shield generator,” Adora says, “or maybe living quarters. Or both.”

“Looks like shields,” Bow says as he scans it. “Yeah. Okay, the shield generators appear to be idle right now. Looks like a sixteen bit access code and it will activate with proximity, so we had better give it plenty of space.”

“Any life signs?” Adora asks.

“No, nothing so far.”

“Good thing I can teleport us inside,” Glimmer says. 

“Why doesn’t Sparkles just take the whole ship in there and blow it up?” Catra suggests. Adora glances at Glimmer to see an odd gleam in her eye; never a good sign when she agrees with Catra on something. Especially something destructive.

Bow jumps in on damage control before she can say anything.

“Catra, no! We need salvageable tech!” Catra rolls her eyes, leaning back in the chair and crossing her arms, disappointed.

“Fine. But we should still blow it up when we’re done.”

“I second that.” Glimmer says firmly.

“There must be some kind of alarm system,” Adora says, trying to draw the conversation away from pyrotechnics. “I can’t imagine they would leave something like this completely unmanned.”

“Oh I’m sure there are defense mechanisms we haven’t seen yet,” Catra says. “I still haven’t forgotten Light Hope’s penchant for arachnids.”

“Anyway,” Bow says. “There’s a lot of hollow space between the antennas at the core. If we can get inside there we should be able to disconnect it from the power source. There’s too much interference to detect exactly what is inside, but we’ll definitely want to start there.”

“So,” Adora says, frowning thoughtfully as she considers their options. “Bow and Glimmer can teleport inside, I’ll patrol the—”

“Oh no,” Glimmer says firmly. “You’re not going anywhere.”

Adora frowns. “What? No! I should go out there with you, if something goes wrong I can…oh…” she trails off, her face reddening slightly as Catra levels her with a stern glare and Glimmer crosses her arms. Why is it so easy to forget about She-Ra being the cause of all this? She sighs.

“Glimmer and I will go alone,” Bow says after a moment. “You two stay with the ship.”

“You can man the gun, Adora,” Catra suggests with a grin.

“Uh, yeah, target practice has never really been my thing.”

“It’s easy, just don’t hit Bow and Glimmer; you can hit literally anything else,” Catra says in an offhanded tone. Adora shoots her a dirty look, but says nothing.

“So it’s decided!” Glimmer says. “Okay Bow, let’s suit up!”

****

…

****

**  
**

Catra parks Darla just outside the detection range of the proximity sensor, and in ten minutes Bow and Glimmer are suited and working. Adora hates the gunner’s pod; it’s a claustrophobic space, about the size of her closet in Brightmoon (which can fit Catra and all their clothes comfortably, but not much else), and lined with way too many buttons that hold no meaning for her whatsoever. Who’s idea was it to put her in here? Right. She eyes the control stick and tests it out gingerly, watching as the gun swivels far too quickly for the amount of input she’d just given it, and she snatches her hand away like she’s been shocked.

Adora really prefers a sword.

Bow’s anxious voice filters through the comms. “Easy Glimmer. There you go.” 

“Bow, I know how to set a charge,” Glimmer says irritably.

“Sorry, I’m just nervous.”

“Well, stop, you’re making _me_ nervous. Third charge set.”

Adora is trying not to bounce her leg too much for fear of bumping anything important. If only they would let her outside. She feels normal; Glimmer’s spell did it’s work. Yet here she sits. 

“Okay, finished placing charges in the core. Moving to—”

“Hey, not to rush you or anything but we’ve got incoming,” Catra says sharply.

“What?” Adora squints at her targeting screen, but the scope is too narrow to find anything, so she looks out the window. She sees nothing. “Where?”

“Two minutes out. Oh...shit. I knew we should have blown it up!” 

“What’s going on?” Bow squeaks over the comm. 

“We’re being hailed.”

“Don’t answer it!”

“I might be able to stall…”

“Catra, don’t d—”

_“Unidentified vessel, declare yourself. This is ITS Patrol 800, you are operating in restricted space.”_

“Patrol 800, this is Cassian 42, supply run to Krystis, our navigation system is compromised, requesting assistance.”

Adora is nearly overcome with a sudden swell of pride. _Damn, Catra’s good._

“Keep it up Catra!” Glimmer hisses over their isolated channel. “We’re almost done with the shields.”

_“Cassian spacecraft, this is not a repair station. The closest port is Horak, what is the state of your navigation system? Are you able to use waypoints?”_

“Affirmative,” Catra says, her voice steady. “Equipment failure cut off our nav database, but manual mapping is functional.”

_“Cassian, standby to receive coordinates and waypoints to Horak Space Port.”_

“Standing by to receive.”

Adora’s heart is pounding as the patrol of four ships approaches. She can see them out of her window now; they bear some resemblance to Darla, but are much sleeker and look like they could fly laps around their old junker in comparison. She glances to the asteroid field, then the station, and the route home; none of those options lend themselves to a clean exit.

_“Cassian, what is your cargo? I see no record of a supply run to Krystis today.”_

“Rations transport and test equipment. It might not be on ITB record, we’re from the JHL.”

If Adora weren’t so familiar with Catra she wouldn’t notice the note of uncertainty in her tone. 

_“Cassian, lower shields and prepare to have your cargo inspected.”_

“Negative, our airlock seal is malfunctioning, you’ll have to run a scan.”

_“We can create our own seal. Lower your shields and prepare for boarding.”_

“Are you guys done with those shields?” Catra hisses after a moment. 

_“Lower your shields or we will assume your intentions to be hostile.”_

“Not yet!” Bow squeaks.

“Oh, screw this!” Glimmer says abruptly. 

_“GLIMMER, NO!”_

Adora stares out at the station as an explosion of purple rips through the nearest edge of the torus. It’s strikingly beautiful.

“Ugh, all that chatter for nothing! They’re locking onto us, you two better get back on board; Adora!” Catra snaps. 

Adora jumps, momentarily mesmerized by the massive explosion outside, and remembers she’s sitting at the controls of a very large weapon.

“Should I fire?” She asks, eyes flicking from the explosion to the ships. Where are Bow and Glimmer?

“I mean whenever you’re comfortable, there’s no rush,” Catra says dryly. 

Adora swears at Catra, then swings the cannon around, and for the first time in her life, fires at their attackers. 

She misses. Not that she really thought she’d be able to hit them, but it still stings. The response is four simultaneous shots that wreak havoc on Darla’s shielding, sending the old ship reeling back. Panicked, Adora fires off several more rounds, none of which come close to contact. Her only solace is that at least she’s distracting them…a little.

“Adora, move!”

Glimmer teleports with Bow behind the gunner’s chair, seizes Adora and teleports her back to the bridge. The ships are in attack formation, and Adora ducks, jumping towards Catra automatically as another round of fire hits them, but topples as Darla does a full spin at the impact.

“Catra get us out of here!” Glimmer shouts. 

“I’m working on it!”

“Keep it stable, I’m going out there!” Adora shouts as she scrambles to her feet, and without waiting for an answer she turns and runs towards the loading bay, blood pounding. 

“No, you can’t!” Catra almost jumps out of the chair, and Adora turns to face her.

“The station is down! I’ll be fine, just get us into that asteroid field!” Adora whips around, “for the Honor of Grayskull!”

“I knew we were going to end up in there!” Bow wails. 

“Shut up, you don’t have to drive!” Catra shouts.

She charges to the loading bay, through the airlocks, and out into space. It still feels strange to be out in space with no suit, even after the dozens of times she’s done it, but She-Ra provides a warm bubble of protection as always.

Drawing herself a platform with the sword, she jumps off of it to stop herself from floating into space and glides smoothly to the rear hull and looks out at their attackers. She can feel the stabilizers turning them towards the asteroid field, but Darla’s systems are sluggish in comparison to the agile patrol ships. A shot fires right at her, and she raises the sword, deflecting it easily.

“Bad move!” She growls.

A blast of energy erupts from the sword, scattering the patrol like roaches. Adora wastes no time in swinging it again, sending another, bigger blast, this time clipping one of the ship’s wings. She activates her earpiece.

“Go!” She shouts.

Darla shudders under her feet as the ship surges forward, and Adora seizes a maintenance railing to keep herself anchored. She sees a flash as Bow unleashes a volley of laser fire at the Eternian ships, forcing them to retreat far enough to keep them inaccurate. These pilots are clearly better than Prime’s bot ships, which means they’ll need a different strategy; energy blasts give them breathing room, but it also gives their attackers time to call for backup. Hopefully the asteroid field will give them some more options.

****

~~~~

****

****  


“Sparkles, if you get any closer to me I will bite your face.”

“I’m just trying to get a better view!”

“You have the entire window, why—?”

Darla shudders violently as they sideswipe another asteroid. Catra hisses, eyes flicking towards Glimmer briefly, her expression tight with irritation. This is already difficult enough as is; she really doesn’t need a backseat driver. “Find us somewhere to go!”

“That’s what I’m trying to do!” Glimmer spits back, reaching over Catra and flicking a switch; a holographic heads-up display appears, mapping out the area around them. Glimmer begins flicking through and zooming in on areas to study.

Catra meanwhile turns back to the task at hand: not getting pulverized by floating rocks. Darla’s stabilizers are good, but they are slow compared to many other more modern ships; this means Catra has to plan her movements ten seconds in advance so that the ship is in the right position at the right time. After a particularly challenging squeeze between three asteroids drifting slowly together, Adora’s voice comes over the comms, her tone decidedly mischievous.

“I’ll have to find a way to commend you on your flying skills later,” she says pointedly.

Catra grins. “It’s all in the hands, Princess.”

“You’ll have to show--”

“As much as I condone this, time and a place!” Glimmer barks. “Plan!”

Adora clears her throat, and Catra has to stifle another smirk, and then swears as she sideswipes another asteroid, jerking the ship to the left to avoid additional damage.

“You deserved that,” Glimmer growls.

“Yeah, probably. Right. Plan. Sparkles! Adora! What’s the plan?”

“If we can put enough distance between us we can loop around and charge them head on,” Adora suggests.

“These assholes are too fast,” Catra grunts as she’s forced to roll the ship over and dive downward underneath a larger asteroid before jumping left around another. “As impressive as I am, I don’t know if I can give us enough room for that.”

“Hold on!” Glimmer says. She turns to Catra and grins wickedly. “I have a terrible idea.”

“I’m all ears, Sparkles.”

“This thing,” Glimmer points to a section on the holographic map: a giant asteroid.

“Cool, why should I care?” Catra says through gritted teeth as they take fire from the Eternian ships again. A flash of light tells her Adora is working overtime to give them space. They can’t keep this up. 

“There’s a big crevice in the side of it! Scan says it’s wide enough. We fly in there, bait them to follow, teleport to the other side and blow it up!”

Catra takes a moment to process this information. It assumes many untested things: that Catra can navigate Darla at top speed through an asteroid field, that Glimmer can teleport the entire ship, and that Adora can blow up a Brightmoon sized asteroid. But aside from that, she loves it. 

“Glimmer, that’s insane!” Bow yells. “You’ve never teleported the ship before!”

“I’ve teleported a skiff!”

“That was a _skiff!_ ”

Bow’s voice graduates to a shriek and Catra can’t blame him, but she has bigger questions that need answering. “How wide is this opening?”

“Uh…” Glimmer turns to the screen, and her face pales slightly, “fifty feet wider than we are, and fifteen feet taller.”

Catra grins; the bigger the challenge, the better. “Sounds good to me!”

“If you scrape me off on an asteroid, Catra…!” Adora shouts.

“Relax, Princess, I’ve got this!”

She locks in on the asteroid up ahead, and then indulges her itching fingers and opens up the throttle all the way.

Darla jumps forward like a jackrabbit, and it now takes all of Catra’s concentration to weave between the asteroids. Finding a wide enough gap, she flicks the controls left with far less subtlety and hisses out a breath as all of her organs compress together with the sheer force of the turn. Full power turns are supposed to be delicate. Right on cue, Bow’s frantic voice greets her ears.

“Catra, slow down on those turns, Darla isn’t designed for it!”

“Okay!” She says, and immediately after throws the ship into a hard right for the final alignment. Adora lets loose an indignant squeal at this, and as they line up with the immense asteroid Catra punches it forward once again. 

_“Catra!”_ Bow shouts.

“Okay, now I promise!”

As they get closer, Catra realizes that fifteen feet of margin is quite a bit smaller than she’d thought.

“Catra…” Adora says warily.

“Hold on,” she replies in a clipped tone.

The crevice widens as they approach, but not quickly enough for Catra’s insides. She grips the controls tightly, jaw set, eyes trained on its center. On the scanner she can see the four ships attempting to close the gap; they’ve taken the bait and appear to be following them inside. Even if they hadn’t, Catra doubts they would have been prepared for the asteroid exploding. As insane as it is, it’s not a bad plan.

“Catra…!” Adora’s voice rises.

They’re inside the chasm before she can answer, threading between two layers of rock with far more precision than even Catra had banked on. She is impressed with herself on a regular basis, but she didn’t think she was that good. However, the magic does not last. Keeping Darla centered is like keeping Swift Wind in a stall: virtually impossible. Adora shrieks as the ship drifts up and Catra overreacts, pushing the nose down and smacking the bottom of the crevice. 

“Keep it together!” Glimmer shouts, one hand on the arm of Catra’s chair, and she drops down to place the other on the floor. 

Catra’s concentrating so hard that she doesn’t even have the presence of mind to bite back.

“It’s narrowing!” Adora shouts. “Glimmer, you’d better make your move!”

“Working on it!”

The walls are closing in on all slides, and Catra dares a brief glance at the scanner to see that one of the ships has followed them in, two of them hovering just outside the crevice, and the other making its way around to intercept the front in case there is an opening.

The glance costs her, and the right side of the ship catches off the ever closing ceiling, tilting it perilously down. As Catra goes to engage the left stabilizer, it splutters and dies; evidently it intercepted a few too many asteroids and laser shots.

“Do it now, Sparkles!” She yelps. Glimmer’s eyes as squeezed shut in concentration, and the ship begins to flicker, the familiar sensation of being sucked down a giant drain tugging at Catra’s feet.

Before she can steel herself against one of her least favorite sensations, something far more terrible takes her attention: the end of the crevice. At this speed, they’ll be vaporized. A shriek escapes her without her permission and her hand flies to Glimmer’s arm; is this it, is this really how she’s going to die? She squeezes her eyes shut, and then her vision explodes in pink, her body is pulled into the familiar, terrible vacuum and when she opens her eyes she sees more asteroids and stars, and Glimmer is sitting on the floor breathing hard. 

_“AAAAAAARGH!”_

Adora bellows through the comms so loud that Catra flinches, and the space around them erupts into a blinding burst of golden light. Behind them, the asteroid splits in two as She-Ra’s magic rips through it, sending debris flying in every direction. On the scanner, two of the four ships vanish immediately. 

“Hold on!” Catra shouts. She throttles up again and noses the ship down as steeply as possible, diving between a few more asteroids to try and get out of range. 

After a minute or so of tense flying, the asteroids begin to thin out, and Darla’s overworked and extremely abused engines begin to whine softly. Cutting power, Catra exhales, leaning back in the pilots’ chair and checking the scanner again: nothing. Glimmer gets to her feet, looking a little ashen, but otherwise okay. She grins at Catra weakly.

“That went well, all things considered,” she says. Catra snorts.

“Sure,” Bow squeaks. “I mean we’re flying a ship with all left stabilizers destroyed and whose structural integrity is highly suspect but all things considered it went great!”

Catra is considering responding when she hears the loading bay doors open and close, and Adora walks back onto the bridge. She’s still She-Ra, and even as godly as she is, her appearance is frazzled. She walks up to them, and then shifts back into herself again before sitting down on the floor and flopping onto her back, removing her earpiece.

“Well, they won’t be following us,” she says after a moment. “There was one ship on our tail I’m pretty sure I obliterated. Don’t know about the others, but they were awful close to have gotten out unscathed.”

“Don’t see them on the scanner,” Glimmer says.

“That doesn’t mean they aren’t out there.”

Catra turns to see Bow walking onto the bridge as well, looking like he was personally bouncing off the walls of the asteroid and not the ship.

“Darla,” Adora says wearily. “Diagnostics.”

“Hull breach in upper storage, emergency airlock seal engaged. Damage to left engine, left fore stabilizer, left aft stabilizer, left undercarriage stabilizer—”

“Yeah, we get it,” Catra groans. “The ship’s busted.”

“Can you fix it Bow?” Adora asks.

“I can probably get the stabilizers online, but we will need materials to fix the hull breach.”

“Materials we did not bring on board,” Glimmer groans.

“I knew we were forgetting something,” Adora sighs. Then, she sits up. “Catra!”

Catra startles, even though she’s been watching Adora this entire time. She smooths her fur down irritably, expression sour.

“What?”

“Did they transmit coordinates to that station? What was it called…uh…”

“Horak,” Glimmer supplies.

“No,” Catra says. “But it could be in our database. Darla, Horak Space Port, directions.”

There is a brief pause.

“Horak Space Port. Warning: chart information out of date, year three zero zero zero zero —” 

“Yeah, yeah, just tell us where it is already!” Catra barks.

Another pause.

“Zero, zero, zero…”

Catra drops her head into her lap, and in sync with her groan, there’s a soft ping.

“Coordinates set: Horak Prison.”

Catra gulps; a prison? Nobody said anything about a prison. 

“It uh…it is out of date,” Bow says, though it sounds more like a question than a suggestion.

Looking up, her eyes fall to the coordinates on screen. No way. Bow gasps, clearly recognizing the association, and Adora is gaping as well. Glimmer is the first to recover.

“Those…” she says. “Those are the coordinates the Eternians sent Adora.”

“It’s six hours away in our current state,” Bow says in a small voice. “But it’s closer than anything else. We won’t make it home like this.”

A ringing silence follows this announcement, and Catra considers what they are up against. They’re flying into an unknown space port with a broken ship, in the direction their enemies wanted them to go. If they stay where they are, another patrol of Eternians are sure to find them, and if they try to go home, they’ll be stranded space junk by day’s end with no hope of rescue. Given they killed at least one of the pilots, she can’t imagine the Eternians will be thrilled. All in all, they’re pretty much screwed.

Catra laughs, and engages the engines — which cough several times before reigniting — once again. 

“What the hell,” she says. “I guess we’re going to Horak Space Port.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo! The squad finally saw some proper action! I have had the last scene in my head since like....August. When I finally got the chance to write it in November I was so stoked. 
> 
> Nerdy fact: when speaking to each other, pilots don't actually say "this is" when talking about themselves. They will always state the name of who they are talking to, and then their own callsign/name. However, it reads bad so that's why you hear them say "this is" in books/movies.
> 
> Anyway, on a more serious note, I am going to be taking a hopefully short hiatus after this chapter. I am having surgery this weekend (not super serious but I'll be down for a few days), and on a lighter note, I started writing the ending (last third) of this story because middles are hard, it turns out. Once I get that done, I'll have a more solid idea of what I'm building to. I have know the ending of this since I started working on it in July, but I just want it all down on paper, ya know? Anyway, I'm guessing it'll be about a month, maybe a bit more? Could be less though, we'll see. 
> 
> Songs for this one can be found here: [First one ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hl_E5RNPbfQ), [Second one](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2hRTLdvdnk)
> 
> Fun fact, I actually invented the entire chase scene to the second song, because that's how I write action a lot of the time lol. 
> 
> Sorry for the novel in the notes, as always, [come say hi on Tumblr](https://library-of-crazy-221b.tumblr.com/), and thank you all for the kudos and comments!


	9. Not Hordak

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Horak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, I'm not dead!!!
> 
> There's a long list of reasons why this is late, but I dont feel like listing them. I will say tho, this chapter was an ass to write. Idk what kind of schedule I'll keep, I have the next chapter mostly done but my editor is super busy so it'll take longer for the editing bit but eh, it wont be as long as it took for this one. Also, I achieved my goal and wrote the ending! Or rather the last third. It's about....30k? Weirdly on target. However I'm probably gonna rewrite a bunch of it but I do have a better idea of where I'm heading.
> 
> Once again, thank you to my lovely editor Jessica and to all of you! Your comments/kudos make my day. Enjoy!

“If you’re here to tell me I have to get out and push again…” Adora groans.

“No, I’m here to relieve you. Really, you both should be sleeping,” Glimmer says in her best commanding voice. It doesn’t have the desired effect.

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” Catra grunts.

“Catra don’t say that,” Adora whines from the floor; how long has she been laying on her back like that? She looks like a toddler, post tantrum. “Besides, I already slept! For fourteen hours!”

“Doesn’t mean you don’t need more. Go! Now!”

Glimmer points off the bridge, and Adora sighs, pulling herself obediently to her feet. “Catra?”

“I want to see us through this asteroid field,” Catra replies, though she’s flying the ship with only one finger, her feet propped up on the other arm. “I’ll join you once we’re through.” Glimmer struggles to imagine it’s very technical flying. It looks extremely uncomfortable. Perhaps there is another reason for her wanting to stay.

Adora merely shrugs and leaves, unwilling to argue the subject. Glimmer yawns, still not entirely awake herself. After a minute or so of silence, she turns to Catra.

“How many times did she have to go out there?”

“Three.”

“Seriously? As if she didn’t have enough to do...I really hope Darla can make it,” Glimmer groans. “Did Bow fix the transmitter?”

“He’s still working on it.”

“Great.”

Darla had been sprouting problems like garden weeds ever since they set their course for Horak. The transmitter was busted, cutting them off from any support back home, and of the stabilizers which had been intact after the fight, most failed every time they tried to use them. When this happened, Adora stepped in with She-Ra to push them back on course while Bow attempted repairs. Trying not to think about what could happen if they are unable to fix the ship before reaching the port, Glimmer sits on the corner of the chair’s arm, just in front of Catra’s feet.

“You’re blocking my view,” Catra grunts.

“If you sat up straight you wouldn’t have this problem.”

Catra merely grumbles. They sit in silence for a moment; Glimmer watches Catra as she flies, trying to gauge her mood. She’s staring straight ahead, eyes fixed on the window, but Glimmer gets the impression her mind is elsewhere.

“Seems like taking out the transceiver station did the trick,” Glimmer says in an offhand tone. Catra bites.

“For now,” she mutters. Glimmer raises her eyebrows; she isn’t interested in prying information out of Catra one painstaking piece at a time. The silence grows, Glimmer eying the increasingly irritated pilot with intense, unrelenting scrutiny. After a minute or so, Catra’s ears twitch back, and she cracks.

“But what if something had happened when it blew up?” she snaps. “What if something went wrong, what if that patrol had some kind of…anti-She-Ra weapon. And still, she blundered out there just…ugh, forget it.”

“I didn’t like it either,” Glimmer sighs; she agrees, Adora’s jaunt into space as She-Ra had been…”suboptimal” as Entrapta might put it. “But, we would have been destroyed without her, Bow couldn’t take on all four at once.”

“The shields would have held a bit longer; there was no need for her to throw herself out there like an idiot,” Catra retorts, but there’s little fire behind her accusation. Glimmer rolls her eyes.

“You don’t know that. And if something had gone wrong, I could have gotten her, I still had my suit on anyway. Besides,” Glimmer sighs heavily, her voice decidedly lacking enthusiasm. “We’re all alive and unharmed. So, either way that’s a win.”

“Yipee.”

Perhaps they should be more excited about being alive, but it’s a hollow and annoyingly familiar victory. Her mind drifts to the battle: it felt like just another day, another fight. The adrenaline is gone already, leaving her feeling quite normal. She wonders if Catra feels the same way. Shaking her head, Glimmer checks the coordinates and their course again, taking her mind off of Adora. “I wonder why Darla says it’s a prison,” she says after a moment of thought.

“Probably because it’s a prison.”

“No, I mean…oh, forget it.”

A brief, awkward silence follows this, and then Catra sighs. “I don’t know, I mean they were willing to send us there, at least till they figured out who we were, and they called it a space port.”

“So, maybe it was a prison once, but it’s been converted. I mean…Darla has thousand year old data,” Glimmer says thoughtfully.

“Yeah, honestly it’s a miracle we haven’t gotten lost more often,” Catra chuckles. “What I can’t figure out is why they didn’t recognize us. Or at least, not until they were close. They didn’t even seem suspicious.”

“They probably weren’t expecting anyone to know where they were,” Glimmer says, thinking back on how genuine the patrol had seemed at first. “They were more annoyed we’d gotten lost and wandered here than afraid of what we might be doing. And Darla does look a lot like a Cassian transporter, we got loads of comments during our travels.”

“That’s why I picked it,” Catra sighs. “I suppose it makes sense. Though Horak isn’t all that far from the transmitter station…why wouldn’t they have expected us? I mean, they were trying to send us to the same space port…”

“Unless they didn’t know about it,” Glimmer says, a thought coming to mind, and her heart jumps. “Catra—”

“No.”

“Think about it!”

“Why?”

“Why wouldn’t they have known? What possible reasons might their superiors have to not tell them about us? Especially when they know we might end up in their proximity, why not tell the patrol guarding their big powerful transceiver station?”

Catra stares at Glimmer hard, looking dubious, and says nothing. However, this does nothing to deter Glimmer’s thought process; she’ll cling to any shred of hope she can latch onto.

“Their superiors don’t know about it,” Glimmer says triumphantly. “Somebody is trying to help us.”

“By luring us into space? By attacking Adora?” Catra snaps. “Are you as stupid as you look?”

“I…” Glimmer bites her lip, unsure if she has a suitable answer right now. “I can’t say, but maybe they aren’t trying to hurt her. And maybe — and I mean _maybe_ — there’s an Eternian out there who wants their project to fail. If we’d never known about it, where would we be now?”

“They weren’t counting on us being able to track the signal,” Catra sighs. “That much we know for sure.”

“But the vision Adora had,” Glimmer says coaxingly. Catra purses her lips and looks away. Glimmer grins; she knows she’s won. “Come on, Catra. There’s no way any sensible enemy would want to give away that much information.”

“I’m still not convinced,” Catra says stubbornly. “Just assume I’m going to be suspicious of every option and you won’t be disappointed.”

Glimmer rolls her eyes, loath to admit she agrees; as much as she likes this idea, she can’t get attached to it. There’s too much uncertainty, and regardless of whether or not they’ve had help, they’re still walking into unknown territory.

“Well, we’re going to need suspicion,” Glimmer sighs. “If the Eternians are using Hordak…er…Horak—”

“I’ve done that at least three times in my head already.”

“Why do they have to be so close?”

“I didn’t name the damn thing.”

Glimmer scoffs and shakes her head, staring back out the window again, thinking of the arduous journey before them. “Either way, if they’re using Horak, we’ll need to be careful. They might be looking for us.”

“Oh, I am counting on it,” Catra says in a low tone, her expression hard. Glimmer grins.

“You know,” she says quietly after a brief pause, “I feel a bit bad for saying this but…I’ve kind of missed all the action. I mean, the exciting part, not the painful part.”

Catra chuckles, and glances up at her with a rare genuine smile. “Feeling’s mutual, Sparkles.”

They both laugh at the absurdity of their preferences.

“Are we broken?” Glimmer asks.

“Probably,” Catra says. “But I’m not going to get worked up about it.”

“Yeah,” Glimmer watches as Catra throttles the left engine a little extra, and it coughs, making the ship shudder as it lurches back on course. “This isn’t like any enemy we’ve faced though.”

“How different can they be, really? I mean, they were fighting Prime for the same thing and lost.” Before Glimmer can say anything else, Catra yawns widely, a small squeak escaping her as she does. Glimmer giggles.

“Aw,” she coos. “Need a cat nap?”

“Shut up,” Catra growls harmlessly.

Glimmer chuckles, and leans over the chair. “Go sleep. I’ve got this, we’re going so slow the asteroids will move out of the way long before we hit them.”

Catra frowns, looking like she wants to argue but Glimmer can see the fatigue in her eyes.

“Fine,” Catra says with another yawn, and she slides out of the chair, stretches, and then saunters away. Glimmer turns and watches her go, and as she passes by one of the floor lights there’s a sudden glint at her hip; is she wearing jewelry? Before she can call out, the ship shudders; another stabilizer, gone. Cursing, she reaches for the controls and freezes, scanning the buttons and levers and trying to remember which is what. After a few tries and a disconcerting lurch in the wrong direction, she hits the right button and the ship levels out.

“Catra, I don’t know how you make sense of this…” she grumbles, switching back to holographic controls. Once this is done, she settles into the pilot’s chair, trying not to think about the fact that they’re basically flying scrap metal with some thrusters strapped on. Staring out into the emptiness of space is not a good activity for quieting the mind, so Glimmer jumps to the ultimate distraction and flips on her comm.

“Hey Handsome, how are the repairs going?”

“Well,” Bow says after a brief pause, and he sounds out of breath. “I’m still working on the communication systems, but they’ve been badly damaged. Our range is limited and we won’t be able to get any messages back home without serious repairs, if at all.”

“Ugh, okay,” Glimmer’s good mood at hearing Bow’s voice is soured by the report, but it isn’t like she expected anything different; luck is clearly not on their side for this voyage.

“But, I was able to divert some of the right engine’s power to the left to give it an extra boost so we don’t have to do so many course corrections.”

“I knew there was a reason we got engaged,” Glimmer says lightly, and Bow chuckles. “But seriously, are you done yet? You’ve been at it for hours, you need a break. Also, I’ve been up here for five minutes by myself and I’m already bored.”

“Give me five more.”

True to his word, Bow trudges onto the bridge five minutes later looking greasy and worn out, but it detracts nothing from the experience of looking at him. If anything, Glimmer thinks it’s a good look. She smiles, and pats the arm of the chair. He sits down on it, taking a drink of water and looking out the windscreen at the asteroids floating lazily by.

“How much longer?” He asks.

“About two hours,” Glimmer says. “You should get some rest, we have no idea what we’ll encounter once we arrive.”

“Yeah,” Bow says anxiously. “We’ll have to be careful.”

He glances at the scanner, which is empty, but Glimmer knows what he is thinking.

“You saw what Adora turned that asteroid into,” she says. “There’s no way they got out of there.”

“Their shield tech could be better than ours,” Bow says, worrying his lip.

“Well, it’s like you said, we’ll have to be careful.”

She looks back outside, wondering if she’s just made the understatement of the year.

~~~~

“Isn’t there a common frequency for this place?”

“Our database is out of date by a thousand years, you really think—”

Bow reaches over Catra’s arm, punching in the frequency listed for Horak Prison. Almost immediately, voices appear through the main comm.

_“—positioned at…ah…thirty-six…north. Unidentified craft, please identify yourself!”_

Catra takes a moment to shoot Bow a scouring look, and Adora smacks her on the arm. This turns the look on Adora, and she points urgently at the comm; now is not the time for being stubborn, what if they have weapons? Grumbling, Catra flips it on.

“Horak Space Port, Cassian 42.”

_“Ah, there you are! Why weren’t you contacting us? Cassian 42 state your intent.”_

“Radio issues. Full stop, need a repair bay.”

_“Okay then…Cassian…uh…standby a minute.”_

“Standing by,” after speaking, Catra turns to the three of them. “Not very professional, are they?”

“Especially not for a spaceport this…” Bow says, gesturing wordlessly at the spectacle in front of them.

“Big.” Glimmer supplies in awe.

Adora merely nods, gaping at the sight looming before them. They’ve been to dozens of space ports and stations before, some of the larger ones rivaling the size of Salineas or the Fright Zone. This one is the size of a small moon. In fact, as they get closer, Adora realizes it _is_ a moon (although she sees no planet nearby), or rather, built on top of one. The station itself appears rounded, almost cylindrical in shape but for the very top level, which is covered in scaffolding; it must be under construction. The flickering lights of civilization are peppered through the four other distinct levels visible above the surface of the moon, the distinction made apparent by evenly dispersed landing platforms on each one; Adora counts maybe a couple dozen, but she can’t be sure. Either way, it’s unlike any space port she’s seen before.

_“Cassian 42, report to Bay Seven, Level Five. Oh, and be ready to submit to a cargo inspection, what is your…uh…designation?”_

“Supply transport,” Catra says, “navigation issues, ran off course into an asteroid field.”

_“Ah, yeah those buggers. Mechanics’ll get you sorted. Just follow the numbers, Five is the third visible level.”_

“Understood, thanks.”

“At least they’re nice,” Glimmer says hopefully.

“They can’t be Eternians,” Adora says firmly. “There’s no way, not after that Patrol.”

Catra guides them to the directed port on the other side of the station. Despite their fragile state, she manages to land without much issue, finally shutting down the extremely overworked engines. Adora holds her breath as they make their way down to the platform; they hadn’t really discussed a plan to deal with any Eternians they encountered right away. Glimmer had suggested her own powers which Adora shot down (”We’re trying not to get noticed!”), Catra had suggested stealing another ship which Bow shot down (”How are you going to learn to fly another ship in ten minutes?!”), and Adora had suggested using She-Ra, which Catra shot down (”What was that you said about not getting noticed?”). After a fair amount of bickering, they’d agreed to do what they always did: just…play it by ear.

Adora is seriously regretting that decision now. However, her panic is interrupted by a whistle.

“Phew! They told me it was rattled, didn’t mention it was in pieces!”

A person whom Adora can only assume is their mechanic walks up to their ship, eying its battered hull with an expression bordering on impressed. They’re clad in overalls and appear to be human: dark skinned, not much hair, and most importantly have an expression of much appreciated warmth. Despite her desire not to trust anyone, Adora realizes then and there how nice it is to see a genuinely friendly face. Granted…they never saw the faces of their attackers, but either way, it’s nice.

“Mieke here,” they say, “I’ll get some diagnostics running for you but I can tell you right now you’ll be needing to rustle up some parts. This is going to be an expensive fix!”

Catra rolls her eyes. “We can manage some of the repairs ourselves, thanks.”

Adora elbows her firmly, and Bow steps in as Mieke looks over at Catra with a raised brow. “We’ll get you the parts, and pay you for as much as we can.”

Mieke seems to buy this as a recovery, and while they make their way around the ship, Adora motions for Bow and Glimmer to get in close. Catra tries to back away but Adora grabs her arm, a flash of irritation on her face; why is she suddenly being difficult?

“How much can we afford?” Adora hisses.

“If they take Etherian gold, everything,” Glimmer sighs. “But I’m guessing gold has no value out here. Probably a credit system like most space ports. In that case, we have about enough for the left engine.”

“Great,” Catra grumbles sarcastically, “and we’re just going to let a total stranger work on our ship.”

“Catra, we don’t have much choice,” Adora snaps. “We need to get communications back and get moving again as soon as possible, and with just Bow as our mechanic the repairs could take weeks; no offense.”

“None taken,” Bow says, waving her off, “Adora is right. We need Mieke.”

Just how much they need them becomes apparent quickly. The damage report is extensive: ten percent hull replacement, damage to the shielding (which Mieke isn’t even able to work on since it’s Entrapta’s modified Eternian design), all the left stabilizers are in need of replacing, the right engine needs a new cooling mechanism, and the left engine needs to be partially rebuilt and refitted with new cowling. If they can find all the parts, it’ll take Mieke five days to conduct the repairs, and that’s if the four of them have the money. Which they don’t. What’s worse, the long range antenna is damaged beyond repair, and the odds of finding a replacement they can afford are small.

“There’s got to be hundreds of antennas around here,” Catra gripes.

“Maybe we can find somebody to transmit a message for us,” Adora wonders aloud; of course, they’d have to find somebody trustworthy enough not to alert the Eternians, which seems…difficult at best.

“Good idea, there’s no way we can afford a new antenna, not without forfeiting all the other repairs,” Bow says.

“We could just steal one,” Catra suggests.

“Absolutely not!” Adora snaps, then winces at the volume of her voice; a few people glance her way, but nobody seems to care enough to linger. She clears her throat, keenly aware of her girlfriend’s death glare.

“If we can get the ship repaired, we can go home and get reinforcements,” Glimmer says. “There must be somebody who can send out a message for us here. Adora, you come with me and we’ll see if we can find somebody. Bow, you and Catra see what you can find for parts. Mieke said there’s a guy on level three who sells refurbished hull-grade steel at a discount. Meet back here in two hours?”

“Since when are you in charge of the plan, Sparkles?” Catra snaps.

“Since she has a coherent plan,” Adora retorts; she makes a mental note to interrogate Catra on why she’s in such a foul mood. They’re all stressed, why does she need to make it worse? Catra doesn’t say anything in response, snatching her earbud from Bow as he hands them out to the three of them.

“Keep in touch,” Bow says, unable to keep the hint of anxiety out of his voice.

“Try not to leave them on though, or it could get distracting,” Glimmer adds, looking pointedly at Adora, who sighs.

She can’t catch a break, can she?

“Guys, I did that _once._ ”

“Yes, and we got to listen to an entire conversation about box formations that was really a bad attempt at flirting you couldn’t read because you’re about as dense as a brick wall,” Catra says with an eye roll. Adora scowls at her, but catches a glint of amusement in her eyes; perhaps there’s hope for her state of mind after all.

“Please don’t remind me,” Glimmer groans. “Okay, let’s go. See you soon, be careful.”

“We will!” Bow says cheerfully.

Adora can only hope Catra shares his sentiment.

~~~~

She hates this. She hates being stranded, she hates using a strange mechanic, she hates the notion that they’ve gone exactly where the Eternians wanted them to go. The smell and the shifty looks she keeps getting certainly doesn’t help either. A pair of cyborgs walk past, and Catra eyes them, ears turned back, tail swishing. They glare. One of them curls his lip slightly. Catra bares her teeth and his companion scurries away, towing him behind her. Catra leans toward Bow, looking forward again.

“I don’t like the looks of these people,” she hisses.

“Maybe if you stopped looking at everyone like you have a personal vendetta against them, that wouldn’t be the case,” Bow says through clenched teeth.

Catra scowls, but he’s right; picking fights would be a bad way to lay low. However, after their brush with the Eternian fighters, she can’t shake the itch; this business of hanging around waiting for something to happen is torture. Can’t they just fight them all and get it over with?

“Whatever,” she grunts, and tries to take her eyes off of every stranger who happens to glance their way, rearranging her expression into something more neutral.

As Bow speaks with various shop owners, Catra watches the passers by and is intrigued; this place is more of a city than just a port. Many of the vendors and services appear to have permanent residence; most of the shops are built into the walls of the station as they make their way through the outer hallway. The four of them had gotten a look at the layout of the inside of the station, and found it fairly simple: it was octogonal instead of cylindrical with seven levels, each one with an outer “ring” of shops, markets, and docks. Narrower hallways lead from each point of the octagon to the central area where elevators transport people and supplies between levels, and a couple of emergency staircases at points on the outer ring. In between the inner and outer rings appear to be housing and storage mainly.

All of this built on top of an old Eternian prison, which Catra wishes she had more time to investigate.

A significant portion of the people passing by are gruff looking with calloused hands, and tough, worn clothing. Many of them also appear to be tinted faintly green, which she would attribute to different species if it hadn’t been on their clothes as well. Unsure of how she feels about this, she crosses her arms, glancing back at Bow as he thanks the shop-owner and returns to her.

“Making friends?” Catra grumbles.

“Got directions,” Bow says, ignoring her tone. “Come on.”

Due to the size of the station, it takes a good half hour to walk around to the other side of Level Three, and Catra notes this level is much quieter than Five where they had docked. The shops are more sparse, and even some of the docks appear to be closed, either for repairs or disuse. Just as Bow points toward what Catra assumes is the shop they’re looking for, something else catches her attention. She stops, ears turning upward, and her gaze lands on a large ventilation shaft running along the outer ring. It’s roughly ten feet above her head, and big enough that she can already hear Entrapta squealing for joy at the sight of it.

However, more interesting is the noise it’s making; it rattles, the sound moving quickly enough she can’t pinpoint the direction it’s coming from before it vanishes. Frowning, Catra keeps still for a moment, listening carefully. Nothing. Was it her imagination? Shaking her head, she makes to follow Bow when something else catches her eye: antennas. Without a second thought, she wanders over to the shop where a display case holds an assortment of half a dozen of them. Judging by the spec sheets on the shelves, they could make use of at least two. She looks around for the shop owner, but they’re either deep in the shop or absent.

Well, that isn’t terribly clever of them, is it?

Catra scoffs at the prices listed; they’re practically begging for it to be stolen. Either that or they’ve never had a patron with an ounce of gumption. After scanning for any sort of motion sensors or force fields, she takes a moment to consider her odds; on the one hand, if she gets a target painted on her back, the next few days are bound to be miserable. On the other hand, if they don’t get in touch with Entrapta and the Princesses, they’re screwed.

Her mind made up, she leans closer, searching for a weak point where the glass might break more easily.

“Hey! Get your grubby paws away from that!”

Glancing around, she spies a burly young man with horns marching toward her from a nearby shop. Catra straightens up and crosses her arms.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she drawls. “I didn’t realize we couldn’t _look_ at the merchandise you're selling. Are you sure you’re in the right business?”

“Get out of here,” he snaps, “or I’ll call security, you filthy little magicat.”

“Magicat? What’s a magicat?”

He barks out a laugh. “Wow, I knew they were all thieves, but never seen one this stupid. It’s what you are, you idiot.”

Catra blinks. It’s strange, being called an idiot, especially in such a derogatory tone of voice. Hearing her go-to definition of Adora thrown back at herself is a new experience, and she isn’t a fan. More startling though is the notion of having a name for what she is, but given the circumstances she’s going to have to unpack _that_ later. As he leers over her, she raises her hand, extending a claw and poking him in the chest.

“Well, that’s a pretty grand generalization, don’t you think?” She says quietly.

The man narrows his eyes, and then smiles. “Careful, little thief. Don’t pick a fight you can’t win.”

Her ears tilt back as she picks up on footsteps behind her. Two pairs of footsteps if she’s not mistaken; they must have been deeper in the shop. One of them reaches out for her, a motion not lost on her senses.

“Hands off!” She snaps.

This does not have the desired effect as a meaty hand grips her shoulder. She stiffens, her jaw tightening, heart rate quickening, and her tail begins to lash back and forth. She barely registers as the leader speaks again.

“Come on little Kitty,” he says smoothly. “Just walk away and you can keep your nine lives.”

Catra flexes her hand slightly, the single claw digging through his clothing. He swats her hand away viciously, the sneer growing impressively large and he clicks his tongue at her, which makes her vision tint red slightly.

“Wrong choice,” he hisses, a little spit getting on her cheek. “You’ll regret that.”

For some reason, this breaks her out of her stupor. Catra grins and chuckles, a twinkle of mirth in her eyes, and he pauses; he glances at his companions uncertainly.

“Look, no offense,” Catra drawls, “but I’ve laughed in the face of a self-proclaimed god. You don’t scare me.”

And without hesitation, she drives her fist through the glass.

Or, she tries. She didn’t look at the glass much beforehand, didn’t take a second to determine how thick it might be, and in hindsight that would have been a really good idea. Her fist makes contact and she hears a crack (is it the glass or her wrist?), but the glass remains intact. If the shop owner and his goons weren’t so busy laughing at her, they probably could have taken her out.

However, they do laugh, and Catra, thanking whatever cosmic powers run the universe that Sparkles and Adora aren’t here to witness this, takes advantage of it. Switching to claws, she finishes the job, ignoring the spray of glass shards and seizing the antenna of choice just as the hand tightens painfully on her shoulder.

Catra twists around with a hiss, clutching the antenna close with one hand and swinging her other around for a punch. He lets go as she makes contact with the side of his face, and — eager to escape being in an evil sandwich — she dives between their legs, rolling out into the hallway and jumping to her feet. Her hand is throbbing and she’s pretty sure it’s bleeding, but she doesn’t care. She looks for an exit, or something she can at least climb on to gain an advantage; all she finds is smooth metal plated walls. She’ll have to get creative.

“Come here you little—”

The leader of the gang charges, delighting Catra with his lumbering attack and apparent lack of combat training. She side steps him neatly, her claws finding purchase in his shoulder as she pulls herself onto his back with one hand. He howls in fury, spinning as he reaches for her. Catra leaps off his shoulders, pouncing on the goon she’d punched the first time, bringing him easily to the ground.

“Wow,” she says, feigning a yawn. “I never thought I’d get bored fighting. Is that really the best you can do?”

As an answer, the other goon makes a grab at her, and to his credit, he’s much quicker than his companions. He nearly gets hold of the antenna, but Catra slips away, dangling it out of reach and grinning. This is too damn easy. The leader lunges for her again, his arm snaking out with surprising speed; he makes a wild grab for the antenna, and actually succeeds. Catra instinctively tightens her grip, but as pain shoots through her fingers she yelps, letting go on reflex.

Her attacker clearly anticipated more resistance, so when she lets go, he pulls away with such force that he loses his balance, then his grip, and the four of them watch as the antenna hits the ground and shatters. Catra, unable to stop herself, cackles.

“Well that didn’t go so well, huh?”

“You rotten—” the leader charges at her again, and Catra readies herself.

However, one of the goons has apparently recovered; as she feels the air move behind her she ducks, narrowly avoiding a fist to the side of her head only to get a foot in the corner of her ribs a moment later. Hissing, she scurries across the floor, low to the ground and ducking underneath more flying fists, looking for an exit.

“Catra!”

Bow’s alarmed voice cuts through the air, and Catra looks around to see him looking aghast, along with a small crowd of spectators. Only now does the full impact of her actions dawn on her, but before she gets the chance to think about them, she catches sight of another fist flying her way and dodges, raking claws across the arm as she does.

Then, something sharp hits her in the shoulder.

“What the—?”

Whipping around, the effect is instant; the world tilts perilously as she moves. She staggers. A growl rises in her throat, and even now as a hand reaches toward her, she lashes out once more, teeth bared. She feels another impact, this time near her ribs, and now she can’t keep track of where her feet are, the hallway and people slide out of focus. She sees new figures approaching her, manages a sluggish, but (in her mind) still fierce hiss before her knees give way as another prickle of pain appears at her neck. The world around her is little more than a cacophony of shapes and colors, and as she’s lifted off the ground, she’s powerless to resist.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woot woot! Hope you all enjoy, comments and kudos welcome and come say hi to me on tumblr, library-of-crazy221b.


	10. Long Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mm...
> 
> Stuff happens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, and welcome back.
> 
> This took longer than two weeks (made evident by the passage of time). Partially me, partially because my editor is busy. It's also February and I always feel like a slug in February. Also I've been a little blocked because no matter how well prepared I am, the middle is just...hard.
> 
> Anywhoo, hope you all are doing well, thanks to my lovely editor Jessica, and also a shout out to [xandrilla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/xandrillia/pseuds/xandrillia) for taking a look at some of this for me, and also for your absolutely mind blowing comments you are so lovely <3.

“Sir, it’s Commander Quill.”

“Enter.”

Quill steps into the room to see General Grayskull standing at his workstation, his gilded uniform and short blond hair neat as always. He looks up as Quill enters, watching silently as his commanding officer springs to a salute. Grayskull does not react for a moment, surveying him as he shifts and fidgets -- clearly ill at ease. 

“Damage report,” Grayskull says, “I want to know everything. Begin with the most critical systems affected.”

“Right,” Quill says warily. “The cannon was compromised. The virus overwrote a third of the code before our backup security protocols caught the breach.”

“Backup security protocols? What about the primary defenses?” 

Quill hesitates. “Sir...Commander Artana wrote most of them. They were programmed to let the virus in. She’s been playing a long game.”

“An incredibly long game,” Grayskull murmurs. Quill searches his face briefly for any sign of danger, but finds only a blank slate, blue eyes staring almost aimlessly past him.

Quill continues. “The fuel cells are still under control, but maintaining stability will be a challenge; we’ve halted all photanium transfers and are running on minimum power to avoid overload. Once we’ve regained regulatory control we can reinstall the backups. That plus time for debugging will take at least a week.”

“Have we located the breach yet?”

“I have five officers under watch, though there are a dozen or so more who interacted with Commander Artana in the last week.”

“Keep them all under surveillance, and revoke security clearances where necessary,” Grayskull says. 

“Yes, Sir. The communication systems are offline. She managed to overload the main power supply and erase half the codebase. Some of the circuits are fried as well, and the parts are not easy to come by. We have a backup radio but the range is limited to the atmosphere. I don’t know how long it will take to get our long range communication running again, but the best we can do in the meantime is ship to ship, which will reach Horak but not much else.”

“What about the ITS?”

Quill shuffles anxiously, and for the first time, Grayskulll narrows his eyes at him. This prompts Quill to straighten himself so much he looks wooden.

“Approximately six hours after the breach, a supply ship picked up a distress signal from the ITS patrol. They reported the station was under attack, but that the explosion came from _inside_ the station.”

“What of the shields?”

“The shield array was still intact, though damaged, when the supply ship got there. We’re still evaluating some of the footage, but one of the last transmissions from the patrol was that it was a Mirren class transport—”

“She-Ra,” Grayskull hisses, turning slowly to face Quill. “Artana has made contact with She-Ra.”

“Sir?”

“There are no Mirren transporters; they were destroyed in the war. If one exists, it crashed on Etheria, and since our craft only responds to Eternians, then She-Ra is the only one who could command it.”

“Why would Artana work with a known enemy?”

The General shakes his head. “It seems we have misjudged her intentions. We need the cannon operational again as quickly as possible. Without the siphoning function, we will be helpless against a magical attack. Do we have any other means of establishing contact with Eternia?”

“No, we would need to send a squadron there.”

“And I’m correct in assuming a portal is out of the question.” 

“Unfortunately yes, that functionality hasn’t been completed yet. The only means is The Empress, which is on Eternia currently. It’s next scheduled supply visit is in three weeks. Shall I send a squadron?”

“No,” The General shakes his head, “we cannot afford to stretch ourselves so thin. Artana means to strike this base. Your best course of action is to attempt to make contact with Horak and see if they are able to relay the message. There should be a handful of officers at that location. In the meantime, I want every piece of information we possess pertaining to She-Ra.”

“Yes, Sir.”

The General turns away from Quill and back to his workstation. “Thank you, Commander Quill. You may leave.”

Quill salutes again and turns to leave but hesitates, looking uncertain. 

“Sir, if you don’t mind me asking…”

Grayskull merely nods, still not looking. 

“Do you think she was part of the Heart of Etheria breach? Commander Artana, that is.”

There’s a brief pause, and Grayskull turns to face him, a frown growing on his face. 

“I have no doubt she was critical to its success,” he says slowly. “I always wondered if family ties might blind her one day. She never had any issues when it came to her parents.”

“Sir?”

Grayskull sighs and looks forlornly at his senior commander. 

“Her parents were killed in battle,” he says, “and she never once stopped her dedication to the fight. Didn’t even attend their memorial. Or so I’ve been told. My father always said she had a ruthless streak, and up until Krytis I admired her greatly. Even after, when my father admonished her cowardice, I still admired her ability to stand by her decisions.”

He lets out a mirthless chuckle, and then his expression turns serious. “Well, she’s certainly done that now. All of the subtle theatrics, the estranged daughter, the heartbreak and treachery, it must have been agony. I should have seen through it, but then, there are so few good engineers...”

“I didn’t know she had a daughter.”

Grayskull chuckles. “Few were privy to such information. You would have known her by her title, and by her role in our magnificent plan to save the universe: She-Ra, Defender of Eternia.” 

A ringing silence follows this. Then, the faraway expression on Grayskull’s face hardens into something else. A gleam of something sharp and malicious shimmers in his eyes as he stares hard at Quill.

“You know I do not seek to harm our own,” he says, his voice barely more than a whisper.

“Of course, Sir.”

“Then you understand the position Artana has put me in. She would see our people destroyed, forgotten in time, a noble empire turned to dust. I cannot let that happen. Find her associates and bring them to me, Quill. Use the hornet venom if you must. Time is against us, but,” a smile curls on his lips, “for all her cleverness, there is a flaw in her plan. It requires She-Ra. She has so few allies...She-Ra is her only hope. Inevitably, she will come here. And we will be ready when she does.”

He nods at Quill, who salutes once more. “For the glory of the Eternian Empire.”

  
~~~~

  
The more she and Glimmer search, the more Adora regrets this part of the plan. What were they thinking? How are they supposed to find somebody trustworthy enough to send their message to Etheria? However, given that it’s their only option besides stealing, she is determined to make it a success. Surely not _everyone_ on this space station works for the Eternians. 

Adora stands on the other side of the hallway across from the shop they’re visiting on Level Five, passing the time by looking at her map of the station. There were a few maps for basic directions at the entrance to hallways and elevators, but they were quite sparse; Adora had sketched a quick diagram on her tablet combining the various details to help keep track of how the place was laid out. It’s not much, but she’s marked Darla’s location and where Catra and Bow were headed, and it’s enough to quiet her nerves somewhat. She’ll take every semblance of control she can get.

She glances over at Glimmer, who is chatting with a shopkeep and buying small items periodically to keep her engaged. The woman looks nervous at Glimmer’s earnest attempt at conversation which doesn’t fill Adora with confidence. However, as she glances anxiously up the hallway Adora follows her gaze, and her stomach churns.

Eternians.

The uniforms tip her off; they’re identical to what she remembers from her vision. Two are marching toward them from the left, and when she glances to the right, she sees three more. That can’t be a coincidence. How did they find them so quickly? Glimmer doesn’t seem to notice the impending danger, and Adora’s hand goes to her ear.

“Glimmer!” she hisses through their comm. No response. “Glimmer, Eternians, we need to go!”

Yet Glimmer makes no indication that she heard Adora at all. Left with no other option, Adora sprints across the hall as the Eternians raise their weapons.

_“Glimmer!”_ she cries. “Look out!”

The shopkeep dives behind the counter and Glimmer looks just in time for a blue dart to bury itself in her shoulder. She twists around to look, appearing mildly stunned for a moment. Then, she collapses.

“No!” Adora shouts. Energy hums in her ears, her blood pounding. As she rushes toward Glimmer, a faint glow envelops her.

Her friend appears dazed, conscious but not aware; so, perhaps they weren’t aiming to kill. But then, what did they want? She whips around to glare at the Eternians, her eyes shining dangerously and it gives them pause.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” she growls.

And then two of them drop like stones.

For a moment, Adora thinks it’s her. She raises her hand; it’s glowing faintly, but it’s still her own hand. Besides, she’s pretty sure She-Ra can’t knock people out with her mind. Meanwhile, the Eternians scatter, suddenly forgetting all about her and Glimmer, and as another one of them falls to the ground Adora sees him jolt backward as he does and it dawns on her: somebody is shooting.

Grabbing Glimmer around the middle, Adora drags her into the shop. The shopkeep is huddled against the wall.

“What do they want with you?” she hisses.

“I wish I knew,” Adora says breathlessly. 

“Requesting backup, Level Six, northwest main corridor!” one of the Eternians calls from a few feet away. 

The air is still for a moment and Adora listens, glancing at Glimmer periodically to make sure her condition doesn’t worsen. Another shout and thud tells her there’s only one Eternian left. Taking a moment to weigh her options, she leans Glimmer against the counter and peers around the door. 

The hallway is completely emptied save a few faces peering through doorways and over counters and shop windows. Adora looks around for the attacker, but knows it’s a fruitless effort; whoever they are, they took the Eternians by surprise; she can’t imagine she’ll have better luck. And yet, the precision of the shots gives Adora pause; if the shooter wanted to kill her, they probably would have done so when she was exposed. Pressing herself against the counter, she shuffles in the direction she thought she heard the last Eternian, peering tentatively over the counter into the shop next to her. 

Her luck holds out, and the hallway remains silent. Squinting into the darkness, she can see a shape huddled in the back of the shop; it’s fairly small, so it can’t be more than twenty or thirty feet away. Adora sees it move and ducks just in time for another blue dart to whiz over her head.

“Repeat, backup needed, Level Six, northwest main! Where are you?”

Taking advantage of his panic, Adora vaults over the counter, cursing herself for not having a better idea. The Eternian yelps — no doubt startled by the sudden rush — frantically loading another dart and firing. Adora dives for the floor to avoid it, and it catches the shoulder of her jacket; too close. Upon realizing he missed, the Eternian brandishes the point of the weapon and charges her; they both know he couldn’t reload before she gets to him. 

Adora doesn’t have time for this. Using She-Ra, she produces a shield, knocking the weapon away and slamming into him with such force that he’s thrown against the wall and slides down, stunned. She lunges at him, seizing him by the collar of his uniform and pulling him close.

“What do you want with us?” she hisses.

The man stares at her dazedly, and (predictably) says nothing. Adora sighs. She looks back out into the hallway where people are tentatively starting to emerge from hiding. Deciding she’s more concerned about Glimmer than the Eternian, she breaks his weapon, grabs a few of the blue darts, and slips back into the shop with Glimmer again. 

“Glimmer?” She whispers anxiously. The shopkeep is gone, but Glimmer hasn’t moved, her head lolling. Adora cups her face in her hands, lifting her head up to get a better look; her eyes are partially open and fluttering slightly. “Glimmer, can you hear me?” 

Yet she still gets no response; ignoring the rising panic, she goes for her earbud.

“Bow, Catra,” she whispers. “Where are you?”

Nothing. Have they been attacked as well? Regardless, Adora recognizes they need to leave as soon as possible. She looks around the shop, but finds it depressingly void of anything useful; there isn’t even a back door. Perhaps she can get herself and Glimmer out and through the hallway before the backup arrives. Her mind made up, she wraps her arms around Glimmer, and then freezes at the sound of running footsteps. 

_Damn it._

“Everyone remain where you are until we have the area secured!”

Adora holds her breath; She-Ra might be their only exit now. If she has to push Darla all the way back to Etheria, she’ll do it. Before she can do that, a light illuminates the shop and she starts, looking to the door to see a figure walking in.

“Are you all right?”

Looking up, she blinks in the flashlight beam and sees a uniformed man peering down at her, looking concerned. The uniform is different from the ones the Eternians wore: light blue with a silver octagon on the collar.

Adora nods, and the man shifts his attention to Glimmer. “Was she hurt in the attack?”

“She fainted,” Adora says hoarsely, possessed briefly by somebody who can lie.

“Fainted?” Glimmer slurs suddenly. Adora freezes. “I didn’t faint, I’m the Que—”

Adora claps her hand over Glimmer’s mouth, her muffled voice still going. She looks up briefly, then lolls again and falls silent. 

“She wasn’t doing that a moment ago,” Adora says. 

The man raises an eyebrow, but nods. “We’re securing the area, hang tight and we can get her some medical attention if needed.”

Adora doesn’t even get to thank him before he disappears, and she blinks, utterly bewildered. Who was that? Where is the Eternian’s backup? What the hell is going on?

“Glimmer? What was that about?”

Nothing. 

A few minutes later, she hears somebody announce the area is secure, and gets to her feet. Glimmer is still unresponsive, and while she doesn’t want to send her away with strangers, she isn’t sure what else to do. She could try healing her with She-Ra, but that would make a scene; Glimmer was talking a few moments ago, so she doesn’t appear to be in serious danger. If Adora can get her back to the ship she might be able to analyze the dart, and try waking her up with She-Ra there. 

Frustrated, she tries her earbud again. “Bow, Catra, are you there?”

A crackle, then — 

_“Adora! Where have you been? I’ve been calling you for the last ten minutes!”_

“Bow!” Adora says, relieved, but then she frowns, confused. “What do you mean? I tried to call you. What’s wrong?”

_“It’s Catra,—”_

Adora’s insides roll over.

_“—she tried to steal an antenna and got in a fight. Some kind of security team showed up and knocked her out with darts and dragged her off!”_

“What? Where? Did you see where they took her?”

_“I had to run, the shop owner I was talking to knew I was with her. I slipped away before anyone saw me. We need to meet back at the ship as soon as possible!”_

“Yeah, we ran into some trouble too,” Adora says. “The Eternians showed up and attacked Glimmer with darts as well. It must be them, their backup is probably on its way here now.” 

“They’re not.”

Adora yelps in surprise, whipping around to see a woman standing in the doorway. It’s difficult to make out her features in the dim light, but she’s tall and inconspicuously dressed, most of her face covered by a scarf which she pulls down, raising a hand placatingly.

“The Eternians followed you here,” she says, “they recovered video footage of the attack on the ITS and traced the ship. They also got visual on Glimmer, that’s why they targeted her. Sorry for cutting you off from your friends, but I had to prevent the Eternians from calling for backup. If your friends ran afoul of somebody, it was likely Horak Security. I can help you clear up the mess, but we should get out of here before they start searching people.”

“I…” Adora is lost for words, struggling to process the sudden assistance from a total stranger. “How...who…?”

“I’ll explain more when we get back to your ship.”

“Wait a minute, who are you?” Adora says, finding her voice.

The woman hesitates, watching her carefully.

“I’m a friend of Mara.”

  
~~~~

  
“Hey, Kid, you in there?”

Catra groans. She feels like her limbs are lead, the distant voice seeping into her mind and breaking her out of her stupor. The last thing she remembers is being dragged through a hallway. Now, after a few moments of rapid blinking, she realizes she’s staring at an extremely bright light. She rolls over.

“Oh, good. Wasn’t sure if you were actually awake this time. Last time I tried you were slurring everything.”

“Piss off.”

“That’s a little better.”

Sitting up carefully, Catra rubs her eyes, as though it might force them and her sluggish mind to get with the program. Where is she? What happened? And who is attached to that annoying voice?

“You’re in holding cell six on Level Two, you apparently picked a fight with a shopkeep and took three darts to take down, which is impressive, though I pride myself on being a four dart problem so there’s some room for improvement. And the annoying, yet charming voice is me, Khaz.”

“What the _hell_ are you doing in my head?” Catra yelps, her heart racing as the room comes more into focus.

“I’m not in your head, you asked questions. I answered.”

“I didn’t—” Catra stops herself, her hand flying instinctively to the back of her neck. No chip, or anything like one. She looks up at the speaker, who’s still fuzzy around the edges. “Wait, did I say that out loud?”

“Yes you did. You’ve been talking pretty much since they brought you in here, I feel like we’ve been friends for years, Catra.”  
  
_Oh no._

She stares blankly at her cell mate for a moment. What did she tell him? Was it anything important? Why can’t she remember? She’s so busy panicking that it takes her a good ten seconds to realize what is quite frankly, far more interesting about the person sitting across from her than whatever terrible secrets she might have spilled in her drug induced stupor. Her mouth falls open.

He looks just like her. 

Well, not exactly. He has amber eyes, his skin is paler than hers, and his shaggy mane of hair is white with dark streaks. His ears are more rounded and a great deal...fluffier. He also looks considerably older and wider than she is, his face a bit wrinkled, but his eyes are bright and lively. If she weren’t so suspicious she’d call them kind. 

Khaz looks down himself, then back at her as she stares. “Is there something on me? Something in my teeth? Or is the sedative still working on you?”

Catra shakes her head. “No...I just…” she trails off, still reeling, then finishes rather lamely, “you...look like me.”

Khaz stares at her for a long moment, his expression shifting to one of confusion. “What do you mean? Have you never seen a magicat before?”

“No,” she says. “Not where I’m from.”

“And where are you from?”

“Why should I tell you?”

“Hey,” Khaz says evenly, “I’m just curious. I’ve never met a magicat who’s never seen another magicat before. This is a new and concerning experience for me.”

Catra is too embarrassed to ask if he’s ever met a magicat who didn’t even know what a magicat _was_ until very recently. But, her identity crisis is going to have to wait, the others are probably trying to find her, that is, if Bow hasn’t been captured himself. This is really not how she intended this day to go...why did she have to screw it up? Her comm link is gone, so of course she has no means of reaching Adora or Glimmer. She turns to face Khaz, eyes narrowed.

“Why are you in here?” she snaps.

“I mistook somebody else’s ship for mine,” he sighs, “and got in a fight over it. I was… _slightly_ intoxicated. I’ve been here all morning, or at least, what the station calls morning. They threw you in here because all the other inmates were scared of you, but you don’t seem that dangerous to me.”

Catra snorts. “Then you’re an idiot.”

“Oh, certainly,” he says with a grin. He seems maddeningly calm for somebody in a cell. “But you haven’t attacked me yet, so it seems I’m right so far.”

“I’d be more than happy to prove you wrong.”

Khaz snorts. “Why? I’m just a foolish old man. Also, if you beat me up you won’t have a way out. This face works it’s magic far better when it’s intact.”

This piques Catra’s interest. She isn’t sure if her attempt at intimidation worked or if he was planning to include her on his little escape plan all along, but it explains why he seems so relaxed. She raises her eyebrows at him.

“Okay, old man,” she says with a faint smirk. “You have my attention. What’s your brilliant plan?”

“Well,” he says, “we have to wait for the shift change first. Which is in about ten minutes.”

“Okay, and then what? Do you have a friend on the outside?”

“You’ll see,” he says evasively. “In the meantime, I’m sure you have some questions.”

Catra does have questions. She has so many questions she can’t even think of a question to ask. She doesn’t want to talk to a stranger, and yet he’s the first person she’s ever met who’s like her, so she can’t quite justify _not_ talking to him. After what feels like an hour of internal debate, she finally comes up with something.

“What is this place, really? I’ve traveled a lot and I’ve never been to this system or heard anyone mention it.”

“Well, the Nousphota System has been out of the way for a long time—”

“Hold on, ‘Nousphota?’ I thought it was the Photanous System.”

Khaz raises an eyebrow at this. “It hasn’t been called that in hundreds of years, but yes, that was its original name. Photanium is the only resource out here, but other systems have other, easier to reach deposits. There aren’t any habitable planets; if a person wanted to live out here, they had to be comfortable living in space full time. Supply ships make runs every few months, but the closest habitable planet is two weeks round trip.” 

He hesitates. “I suppose…Etheria is much closer, but it’s only been on the map for two years, so I don’t really count it. Anyway, I don’t know it’s full history, but Horak did get more popular after the Horde started blasting their way through the universe. Even then not many had the means to reach it. I don’t think they knew it existed for quite some time, they only invaded a few years ago when the rebellions really grew in strength, so they never got a foothold. Now it’s just a mining system, run by the Aris Miners and a few other wealthy parties a couple systems over.”

“The Aris Miners?”

“They moved in a few years ago, seem to be interested in managing this place.” Khaz makes a face, then continues. “They didn’t put us in here though, that’s the old Horak Security Unit. They still function on their own, but I think they’re reporting to the Miners more and more these days.”

Catra scoffs. “How does that work?”

“The Miners have a fleet of security drones. We call them Murder Hornets. Oh, look, shift change.”

Catra watches in utter bewilderment as Khaz gets to his feet and marches up to the door, his ears tilted toward it, still as a statue. He stands there for what feels like forever, and just as the anticipation is about to kill her, there’s a soft scraping sound. Khaz smiles, and taps on the door. A moment later, a slot opens and Catra can see a pair of anxious eyes peering through.

“Hey there, would you be so kind as to let me and my friend out?”

_You’ve got to be kidding me._

“You know I can’t do that...”

“Sure you can. You just open the door.”

Catra wishes she could melt into the floor. It would be her luck to get stuck here with the idiot who thinks he can talk his way out of jail. Granted...Catra’s talked her way out of a cell before but not like this.

However, while she’s trying to conjure up another way to escape, she hears a soft creak, and turns to find the door open with nobody on the other side. She stares blankly at Khaz, who grins, a slight twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

“Told you.”

And then, he marches right out. There has to be a catch. Nobody just walks out of a jail cell. Yet as she follows him tentatively, there appears to be nobody guarding the narrow, dimly lit corridor. 

“How did you do that? Why is nobody stopping us?” she hisses.

“A good bribe goes a long way here,” he says easily. “A word to the wise, Catra. When you can avoid a physical fight, avoid it.”

Catra snorts. “And what about when you can’t?”

Khaz doesn’t even look at her, and doesn’t miss a beat. “End it before it’s begun.”

“Okay…” Catra says, looking away. Her companion smiles at her. 

“Anyway, bribes probably won’t work much longer. Ever since the Miners arrived, the guards are getting…well…scared.” He gestures to the ceiling. Catra looks up.

Her blood chills.

Hanging in rows upside down are the biggest insects Catra has ever seen. However, she’s been in the Crystal Castle enough to know that they’re not actually insects; they’re sophisticated bots. Instead of spiders, these have wings, elongated yellow tinted bodies, and wicked looking claws and stingers, their compound eyes glittering in the artificial light. Catra tenses, her ears flattening slightly and one of the wasps twitches.

“Easy,” Khaz says slowly, “they can smell fear. Literally. Take a deep breath.”

“Could have used the warning sooner,” Catra snaps.

“Forgot. Didn’t realize there’d be so many out here. Usually more spread out.”

Catra shoots him a dirty look, but her eyes are once again drawn up, and she can’t stop staring. Her heart quickens, and a few more of the insects begin to squirm.

“Catra,” Khaz says, his raspy voice so soft she can barely hear it. It’s oddly soothing. “Take a deep breath. Don’t look at them, and keep walking. Please trust me on this.”

Catra glances over at him, her jaw set, blood pounding in her ears. He’s smiling at her encouragingly, an expression so earnest that something deep inside her is screaming to trust it. Yet past experience says otherwise. Why should he care? He barely knows her. The rustling continues to grow louder as the wasps begin to crawl down the walls. 

Khaz reaches out to her shoulder slowly, and when she flinches away he — to Catra’s surprise — stops, drawing back.

“Please,” he says quietly. “I need you to try and calm down.”

Swallowing hard, she manages to tear her eyes away from the mechanical insects, looking down at the floor, and takes a slow, shaky breath. Nothing happens. 

“Do it again,” he says softly. “Keep it up.”

She does, intentionally unclenching her muscles with each exhale, and after a few times her heart slows a little, and the insects begin to quiet. After a few minutes of this, they scuttle back to their places.

“Good job,” Khaz praises. “Those were more sensitive than usual. Most floors have far fewer and they have to be remote activated. Now, come on. We need to get to Level Five.”

Catra narrows her eyes at him, but grudgingly follows. There isn’t another way to go from here anyway. Besides, she needs to find a way to contact the others; Adora is probably freaking out. Catra can only hope she hasn’t gone She-Ra and completely blown their cover. 

Then again, if anyone’s done that...it’s Catra.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, the squad meets my team of old farts. Fyi, don't think I'll ever explicitly mention it but Artana and Khaz are both late fifties, maybe early sixties. 
> 
> Also, how did you like the map? Was it helpful? If you guys liked it I'll include one later on for another location. 
> 
> Thanks for you comments and kudos <3.


End file.
